I think the question I'd ask is; how much of the infrastructure (US flagged ships/crew) has been lost over the years due to the Jones Act? I have to admit, I know very little about the Jones Act other than it's military ramifications. sd
To Eric's point, it's fair to say that all of the current fleet/crews is a result of the Jones Act (Jones Act Eligible) but how much more could it be? I read were the overwhelming number of "hulls" for trans in this country are in barges and stays close to the shore (inland waterways). The "international" fleet went from ~200 in the mid-2000s to around ~80 in 2019 (maritime.dot.gov) Not sure the impact there but what little I know about the Jones Act is that all (100%) of US Military cargo has to go on US Flagged ships so that keeps the US Flagged Fleet viable. So basically, from my understanding, a large portion, or most, of commercial maritime cargo in this country is transported under foreign flagged ships already.
Nearly all of the cargo entering the US from foreign ports travels on foreign-flag ships. There are a few exceptions, but they're mainly US-government/military cargoes. The real question is about domestic cargo movement and domestic fishing boats, tugboats, etc. Looking at the sectors in turn...
There's an enormous amount of cargo transported on the Mississippi River system, like 175 million tons/year to and from the Upper Mississippi (above St. Louis) alone. Likewise on other major river systems like the Columbia. Most of that is commodities (grain, stone, coal, etc.) that nobody's in a big hurry to get. There are some moves to put more containers on barges, but there is a real issue of how quickly people want their stuff. You can move it vastly more efficiently on the water, but people will pay for second day delivery so it goes by air or truck. I would guess that river transportation has only grown during the Jones Act era, but mainly because agricultural yields are so much higher.
Coastwise trade (ie along the coast, not on a river) is a more mixed bag. It's a little hard to separate out what's related to the Jones Act, what's related to the decline of American industrial supremacy (at the end of WWII we had something like 60-70% of the world's total shipbuilding capacity), and what's related to changing technology and consumer demand (see speed of delivery above, also just-in-time and other abominations invented by CPAs). We've lost a lot of coastal trade, but was that due to the Jones Act or due to better railways? There aren't hundreds of passenger ferries on Puget Sound anymore, but that's more about bridges and roads. Passenger liners were killed by cheaper air travel.
Another challenge is that transferring between modes is relatively time consuming and expensive. To take a ridiculous example, you wouldn't truck a container to the river, put it on a barge, transport it 25 miles upstream, and put it on another truck for final delivery. You'd just drive it the whole way. At some point, if the water doesn't go where you need it to, it's easier/cheaper to use other modes.
Fishing boats are a rare case of a very clear cause and effect. Back in the early 70's, the US did a land grab and claimed all of the marine resources out to the 200-mile limit. Prior to that, it was 12 miles. When that happened, there was a boom in the US fishing industry. We currently have domestic factory trawlers where we only had Russian or European boats. A lot of fisheries saw a lot of growth. Unfortunately, the fish stocks didn't hold up to the increased pressure, so the fleets have shrunk somewhat, and/or gotten older as the economics haven't favored replacement. You might remember
@Capt. Eric saying that 25 years is really old for a container ship. Most of the fishing boats I work on are >40 years old. There are a few boats out there built in WWII. Actually, there are a couple of lovely old wooden halibut boats built in the 20's still active in Alaskan waters.
Tugboats never left. It's theoretically possible that there might be more tugs without the Jones Act, but the business is still pretty good.
