Ross group fighting dumping
By Furniture Today Staff -- Furniture Today, November 24, 2003
New York — Financier Wilbur Ross is a staunch defender of American jobs in the face of what he considers unfair international trade practices.
In September, Ross, who has acquired textile producer Burlington Inds. and hopes to acquire Cone Mills, organized the Free Trade for America Coalition, or FREETAC, and now chairs the 42-member group.
It includes representatives of labor unions, industry associations, and individual textile mills.
"We are strongly against what we see as dumping. We organized FREETAC to bring together textiles, steel, cattle, honey and sugar companies that are affected by these unfair practices," he said.
The coalition doesn't include furniture groups, but Ross said he personally backs the antidumping petition filed by a group of U.S. furniture makers against Chinese bedroom imports.
"There's no doubt the furniture industry has been victimized. We would be thrilled if they won," he said.
He added that retailers should support the antidumping petition too, because "unemployed people don't buy a lot of furniture.... It is time for the American people to demand that their government quickly reverse the devastating trade deficit."
