U.S. Steel
315801
225487711
2008-07-13T23:20:36Z
75.104.192.56
/* Labour */
{{Infobox_Company |
company_name = United States Steel Corporation|
company_logo = [[Image:Uss2.gif]] |
company_type = Public ({{nyse|X}}) |
company_slogan = |
foundation = 1901 |
location = [[Image:Flag of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.png|25px]] [[Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania]] |
key_people = [[John P. Surma ]], Chairman and Chief
Executive Officer<br>[[Jim Garraux]], General Counsel and Senior Vice President-Labor Relations & Environmental Affairs <br>[[Gretchen Haggerty]], Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer<br>[[John H. Goodish]], Executive Vice President and Chief Operating Officer<br>[[John J. Connelly]], Senior Vice President - Strategic Planning & Business Development<br>[[Thomas W. Sterling]], Senior Vice President - Human Resources and Business Services |
num_employees = 49,000 |
revenue = {{profit}}[[United States dollar|US$]]16.87 billion (2007) |
industry = [[Metals]] |
products = [[Steel]]s<br>[[integrated steel products]]<br>[[mining]]<br>[[real estate]]<br>[[engineering]] <br>[[rail transport]]<br>[[consulting]]|
homepage = [[http://www.ussteel.com/]]
}}
The '''United States Steel Corporation''' ({{nyse|X}}) is an integrated [[steel]] producer with major production operations in the [[United States]] and [[central Europe]]. The company is the world's seventh-largest steel producer ranked by sales (see [[list of steel producers]]). It was renamed '''USX Corporation''' in [[1991]] and subsequently United States Steel Corporation again in [[2001]] when the shareholders of USX spun off its steel-making assets following the acquisition of [[Marathon Oil]] in [[1982]]. It is still the largest domestically owned integrated steel producer in the States, although it produces only slightly more steel than it did in [[1902]].
U.S. Steel is a former [[Dow Jones Industrial Average]] component, listed from [[April 1]], [[1901]] to [[May 3]], [[1991]]. It was removed under its USX Corporation name with Navistar International and Primerica Corporation.
==History==
[[J. P. Morgan]] and [[Elbert Henry Gary|Elbert H. Gary]] founded U.S. Steel in 1901 (incorporated on [[February 25]]) by combining the steel operations owned by [[Andrew Carnegie]] with Gary's Federal Steel Company and several smaller companies for $492 million. It was capitalized at $1.4 billion, making it the world's first billion-dollar corporation. At one time, U.S. Steel was the largest steel producer and largest corporation in the world. In [[1907]] it bought one of its largest competitors [[Tennessee Coal, Iron and Railroad Company]] which was headquartered in [[Birmingham, Alabama|Birmingham]], [[Alabama]]. This led to the company being listed on the [[Dow Jones Industrial Average]], doing so by taking the place of Tennessee Coal, Iron and Railroad Company. The [[Federal government of the United States|federal government]] attempted to use federal [[Antitrust|antitrust laws]] to break up U.S. Steel in 1911, but that effort ultimately failed. Time and competitors have, however, accomplished nearly the same thing. In its first full year of operation, U. S. Steel made 67 percent of all the steel produced in the United States. It now produces less than 10 percent.
The Corporation, as it was known on [[Wall Street]], always distinguished itself to investors by virtue of its size, rather than for its efficiency or creativeness during its heyday. In 1901, it controlled two-thirds of steel production. Because of heavy debts taken on at the company's formation — Carnegie insisted on being paid in [[gold]] bonds for his stake — and fears of antitrust litigation, U. S. Steel moved cautiously. Competitors often innovated faster, especially [[Bethlehem Steel]], run by U. S. Steel's former first president, [[Charles M. Schwab]]. U. S. Steel's share of the expanding market slipped to 50 percent by 1911.
U. S. Steel's production peaked at more than 35 million tons in 1953. Its employment was greatest in 1943 (during World War II) when it had more than 340,000 employees; by 2000, however, it employed 52,500 people. The federal government has also intervened on other occasions to try to control U. S. Steel. President [[Harry S. Truman]] attempted to take over its steel mills in 1952 to resolve a crisis with its union, the [[United Steelworkers of America]]. The [[Supreme Court of the United States]] blocked the takeover by ruling that the president did not have the constitutional authority to seize the mills. President [[John F. Kennedy]] was more successful in 1962 when he pressured the steel industry into reversing price increases that Kennedy considered dangerously inflationary. The federal government prevented U. S. Steel from acquiring [[National Steel Corporation|National Steel]] in 1984 and political pressure from the [[United States Congress]] forced it to abandon plans to import [[British Steel]] slabs. It finally acquired National Steel's assets in 2003 after National Steel went bankrupt. U. S. Steel acquired Marathon Oil in 1982, as well as Texas Oil & Gas several years later. It reorganized its holdings as '''USX Corporation''' in [[1986]], with U. S. Steel (renamed '''USS, Inc.,''') as a major subsidiary.
At the end of the 20th century, the corporation found itself deriving much of its revenue and net income from its energy operations, so U. S. Steel eventually spun off Marathon and other non-steel assets (except Transtar) in October, 2001.
==Labour==
U.S. Steel maintained the labour policies of [[Andrew Carnegie]], which called for low wages and limited unionization. The [[Amalgamated Association of Iron and Steel Workers]] union that represented workers at the [[Homestead, Pennsylvania]] plant was, for many years, broken after a violent [[Homestead Strike|strike]] in 1892. U.S. Steel defeated [[U. S. Steel Recognition Strike of 1901|another strike]] in 1901, the year it was founded. U.S. Steel built the city of [[Gary, Indiana]] in 1906, and 100 years later it remains the location of the largest integrated steel mill in the Northern Hemisphere. U.S. Steel did reach an impasse with unions during World War I, when under pressure from the Wilson Administration it relaxed its opposition to unions enough to allow some to operate in certain factories. It returned to its previous policies as soon as the war ended, however, and in a [[Steel strike of 1919|1919 strike]] defeated union-organizing efforts by [[William Z. Foster]] of the AFL, later a leader of the [[Communist Party USA]].
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During the 1920s, U.S. Steel, like many other large employers, coupled paternalistic employment practices with "employee representation plans" (ERPs), which were company unions sponsored by management. Ironically, these ERPs eventually became an important factor leading to the organization of the [[United Steelworkers of America]]. The Company dropped its hard-line, anti-union stance in 1937, when Myron Taylor, then president of U.S. Steel, agreed to recognize the [[Steel Workers Organizing Committee]], an arm of the CIO led by [[John L. Lewis]]. Taylor was an outsider, brought in during the [[Great Depression]] to rescue U.S. Steel, and had no emotional investment in the Company's long history of opposition to unions. Watching the upheaval caused by the [[United Auto Workers]]' successful sit-down strike in [[Flint, Michigan]], and convinced that Lewis was someone he could deal with on a businesslike basis, Taylor sought stability through collective bargaining.
The Steelworkers continue to have a contentious relationship with U.S. Steel, but far less so than the relationship that other unions had with employers in other industries in the United States. They launched a number of long strikes against U.S. Steel in 1946 and a [[1959 |116-day strike]] in 1959, but those strikes were over wages and benefits and not the more fundamental issue of union recognition that led to violent strikes elsewhere.
The Steelworkers union attempted to mollify the problems of competitive foreign imports by entering into a so-called Experimental Negotiation Agreement (ENA) in 1974. This was to provide for [[arbitration]] in the event that the parties were not able to reach agreement on any new [[collective bargaining agreement]]s, thereby preventing disruptive strikes. The ENA failed to stop the decline of the steel industry in the U.S.
U.S. Steel and the other employers terminated the ENA in 1984. In 1986, U.S. Steel locked out thousands of its employees when it shut down a number of its facilities as a result of a drop in orders on the eve of a threatened strike. In addition, U.S. Steel and other steel producers demanded extensive concessions from their employees in the early 1980s through the direction of [[J Bruce Johnston]], U.S. Steel executive vice president. In a letter to striking employees in 1986, J. Bruce Johnston warned, "There are not enough seats in the steel lifeboat for everybody." In addition to reducing the role of unions, the steel industry had sought to induce the federal government to take action to counteract dumping of steel by foreign producers at below-market prices. Neither the concessions nor anti-dumping laws have restored the industry to the health and prestige it once had.
==Environmental record==
Based on year 2000 data,<ref>[http://www.peri.umass.edu/Technical-Notes.264.0.html Political Economy Research Institute Toxic 100 Corporate Toxics Information Project Technical Notes retrieved 12 Nov 2007</ref> researchers at the Political Economy Research Institute ranked U.S. Steel as the second-greatest corporate producer of air pollution in the United States. In that year, the company released more than 1.26 million kg (2.8 million pounds) of toxins, chiefly [[ammonia]], [[hydrochloric acid]], [[ethylene]], [[zinc]] compounds, [[methanol]], and [[benzene]], but including [[manganese]], [[cyanide]], and [[chromium]] compounds.<ref>[http://www.rtknet.org/new/tox100/toxic100.php?company1=13659&chemfac=chem&advbasic=bas Political Economy Research Institute]</ref> In 2004, the city of [[River Rouge, Michigan]] and the residents of River Rouge and the nearby city of [[Ecorse, Michigan|Ecorse]] filed a [[Class action|class-action lawsuit]] against the company for "the release and discharge of air particulate matter...and other toxic and hazardous substances"<ref>[http://www.c2lawfirm.com/ussteel.jsp Charfoos & Christensen, P.C.]</ref> at its [[River Rouge Plant]]. In 2005, the [[Illinois Attorney General]] brought suit against U.S. Steel for alleged air pollution in [[Granite City, Illinois]].<ref>[ http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m3MKT/is_37-1_113/ai_n15686749 ''American Metal Market'', 19 Sept. 2005] qtd. in http://findarticles.com</ref>111
The Company has also been implicated in water pollution and toxic waste. In 1993, the [[United States Environmental Protection Agency|Environmental Protection Agency]] (EPA) issued an order for U.S. Steel to clean up a site in [[Fairless Hills, Pennsylvania]], on the [[Delaware River]], where the soil had been contaminated with [[arsenic]], [[lead]], and other [[heavy metals]], as well as [[naphthalene]]; groundwater at the site was found to be polluted with [[polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbon]] and [[trichloroethylene]] (TCE).<ref>[http://www.epa.gov/reg3wcmd/ca/pgm_reforms.htm Environmental Protection Agency]</ref> In 2005, the EPA, [[United States Department of Justice]], and the [[Ohio|State of Ohio]] reached a [[Settlement (litigation)|settlement]] requiring U.S. Steel to pay more than $100,000 in penalties and $294,000 in reparations in answer to allegations that the company illegally released pollutants into Ohio waters.<ref>[http://yosemite.epa.gov/opa/admpress.nsf/835ee120715954a5852572a000657b5f/4f69dcd7751df3c4852570bc0072ec63!OpenDocument Environmental Protection Agency]</ref> U.S. Steel's [[Gary, Indiana]] facility has been repeatedly charged with discharging polluted wastewater into [[Lake Michigan]] and the [[Calumet River|Grand Calumet River]], and in 1998 agreed to a $30 million settlement to clean up contaminated sediments from a five-mile stretch of the river.<ref>[http://www.fws.gov/midwest/grandcalumetrivernrda/documents/USX.pdf U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service]</ref>
It should be noted, however, that with the exception of the Fairless Hills and Gary facilities, the lawsuits concern facilities acquired via U.S. Steel's purchase of [[National Steel Corporation]] in 2003.
[[Image:pittsburgh-pennsylvania-usx-tower.jpg|thumb|The U.S. Steel Tower in downtown Pittsburgh.]]
==Legacy==
The [[U.S. Steel Tower]] in [[Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania|Pittsburgh]], [[Pennsylvania]] is named after the company and the company's offices take up a part of the building. The [[Pittsburgh Steelers]] professional football team borrowed elements of its logo, a circle containing three [[hypocycloid]]s, from U.S. Steel.
U.S. Steel financed and constructed the [[Unisphere]] in [[Flushing Meadows–Corona Park|Corona Park]], [[Queens]], [[New York]] for the [[1964 World's Fair]]. It is the largest globe ever made and is one of the world's largest free standing sculptures.
The [[Chicago Picasso]] sculpture was fabricated by U.S. Steel in Gary, Indiana before being disassembled and relocated to Chicago
U.S. Steel donated the steel for the [[Polish Cathedral style|Polish Cathedral]] of [[St. Michael's in Chicago]] since 90 percent of the parishioners worked at its [[steel mill|mills]].
U.S. Steel sponsored ''[[The United States Steel Hour]]'' television program on CBS.
U.S Steel built [[Disney's Contemporary Resort]] at [[Walt Disney World Resort|Walt Disney World]].
In the film [[The Godfather Part II]], [[Hyman Roth]] tells [[Michael Corleone]] "Michael, we're bigger than U.S. Steel."
== Dividends ==
It is the present policy of the Board of Directors to consider the declaration of [[dividend]]s four times each year, with checks for dividends declared on common stock mailed for receipt on the 10th of March, June, September and December. The current dividend as of 2008 is $1.00 per share. Dividends may be paid by, mailed check, direct electronic deposit into a bank account, or be reinvested in additional shares of U.S. Steel common stock.
== Facilities ==
U.S. Steel has multiple domestic and international facilities. Of note in the United States is [[Clairton Works]] and [[Edgar Thomson Works]], both members of [[Mon Valley Works]] and just outside Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. [[Clairton Works]] is the largest and most environmentally friendly coking facility in North America. [[Edgar Thomson Plant]] is one of the oldest steel mills in the world. The Company acquired Great Lakes Works and Granite City Works, both large integrated steel mills, in 2003 and is partnered with Severstal North America in operating the world's largest electro-galvanizing line, Double Eagle Steel Coating Company, at the historic Rouge complex in Dearborn, Michigan.
U.S. Steel's largest domestic facility is [[Gary Works]], in [[Gary, Indiana]]; Gary is also home to the [[U.S. Steel Yard]] baseball stadium.
U.S. Steel operates [[Fairfield Works]] in [[Fairfield, Alabama]] ([[Birmingham, Alabama|Birmingham]]), employing 1500 people, and still operates a sheet galvanizing operation at the [[Fairless Works]] facility [[Fairless Hills, Pennsylvania]], employing 75 people.
U.S. Steel acquired National Steel and subsequently operates Granite City Steel in Granite City, IL.
U.S. Steel operates a pipe mill, Lorain Tubular Operations in Lorain, Ohio.
U.S. Steel operates two major [[taconite]] mining and pelletizing operations in northeastern Minnesota's [[Iron Range]] under the operating name Minnesota Ore Operations. The Minntac mine is located near [[Mountain Iron, Minnesota]] and the Keetac mine is near [[Keewatin, Minnesota]]. U.S. Steel announced on February 1, 2008 that it would be investing approximately $300 Million in upgrading the operations at Keetac, a facility purchased in 2003 from the now-defunct [[National Steel Corporation]]. <ref>[http://www.duluthnewstribune.com/account/index.cfm?user=login&return_page=http%3A%2F%2Fwww%2Eduluthnewstribune%2Ecom%2Farticles%2Findex%2Ecfm%3Fid%3D59373%26section%3DNews Duluth News Tribune<!-- Bot generated title -->]</ref>
Internationally, U.S. Steel operates facilities in Slovakia and Serbia.
Recently, U.S. Steel added facilities in [[Texas]] with the purchase of [[Lone Star Steel Company]], entered a venture in Pittsburgh, California with Pohang Iron & Steel of [[South Korea]], and purchased [[Stelco]] to expand into the Canadian market. Stelco is now known as United States Steel Canada, the name was changed following the purchase of Stelco by United States Steel.
== References ==
{{reflist}}
* [http://www.ussteel.com/corp/about.htm#The%20History%20of%20United%20States%20Steel U. S. Steel's History of U. S. Steel]
* [http://www.questia.com/PM.qst?a=o&d=34200941 Brody, David. ''Labor in Crisis: The Steel Strike of 1919'' (1965)]
* [http://www.questia.com/PM.qst?a=o&d=94134586 Burn, Duncan. ''The Steel Industry, 1939-1959: A Study in Competition and Planning'' (1961)]
* Misa, Thomas J. ''A Nation of Steel: The Making of Modern America, 1865-1925'' (1998)
* [http://www.questia.com/PM.qst?a=o&d=14201453 Scheuerman, William. ''The Steel Crisis: The Economics and Politics of a Declining Industry'' (1986)]
* [http://www.questia.com/PM.qst?a=o&d=97407297 Urofsky, Melvin I. ''Big Steel and the Wilson Administration: A Study in Business-Government Relations'' (1969)]
* [http://www.questia.com/PM.qst?a=o&d=10469556 Warne, Colston E. ed. ''The Steel Strike of 1919'' (1963)] primary and secondary documents
* Warren, Kenneth. ''Big Steel: The First Century of the United States Steel Corporation, 1901-2001'' (2001).
== External links ==
*[http://www.ussteel.com U. S. Steel]
*[http://www.uswa.com United Steelworkers]
*[http://biz.yahoo.com/ic/12/12969.html Yahoo! — United States Steel Corporation Company Profile]
*[http://www.cs-photo.com/feature/showcase_view.php/105/3/1 Documentary Photographs of U. S. Steel from the 1940's and 1950s]
*[http://www.dlib.indiana.edu/collections/steel/ U.S. Steel Gary Works Photograph Collection, 1906-1971]
*[http://www.bigfloridacountry.com/freevideos/Contemporary%20Construction%20USS.wmv U.S. Steel Movie clip of the Contemporary Resort Construction] [http://www.bigfloridacountry.com BigFloridaCountry]
*[http://GDYNETS.WebNG.com/210.htm The "World's Largest Plate Mill," formerly a part of U.S. Steel-Gary Works]
{{Pittsburgh Corporations}}
[[Category:Companies established in 1901]]
[[Category:Manufacturing companies of the United States]]
[[Category:Companies based in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania]]
[[Category:Steel companies of the United States]]
[[Category:Former components of the DJIA]]
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