May 2016 bring a year of less economic upheaval and uncertainty on the Iron Range.

That’s a wish and a hope that so many people of the region share in and can understand; yet also one they fear will be incredibly problematic to fulfill.

The year 2015 was definitely a difficult one with troubling aftershocks still reverberating, with more likely to come.

Many of the problems with the Range’s No. 1 direct and indirect business — iron ore mining — are not open to a quick fix; nor are they even fixable locally.

We are in a global economy that has not been all that kind to some regions of the country, including Minnesota’s Iron Range.

The so-called benefits of a global economy have allowed countries such as China to prey on U.S. business, especially in the commodities area, and therefore American workers.

The global economy is rife with cheaters, with China again the leading culprit.

And the ore and steel industries, which are critical to the very economic well-being of the Iron Range, have been devastated by the cheating of other nations.

It is truly sad and really humiliating that the U.S. government has relegated ourselves to a position where we have actually encouraged — by our weak government inaction at a federal level — countries such as China to help so heavily damage one of the great industrial pillars of our nation.

There are those who argue you can’t put the genie back in the bottle, referring to a global economy.

Of course you can’t. But that doesn’t mean you let the genie cheat and control our ore and steel industries.

The global economy genie should not rule our country’s marketplace and determine our industrial and business future.

It’s a new year; and time for new action to deal with a problem that was allowed to fester and get alarmingly worse in 2015.

It’s way past time for our leaders in Washington to put America first in trade and business relations with other countries.

Let the genie know that the United States will control its own destiny in a global economy.

 

— The Mesabi Daily News of Virginia, Jan. 4