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    Final Thoughts

    March 5, 2026

    Final Thoughts

    Written by Stephen Miller

    People have asked numerous times over the last several decades variations of the same question: Will there be a scrap shortage in the coming years? And at various times in our metallic history, there has been reason to believe shortages could occur.

    For the most part, I have been on the fence on the subject of potential scrap shortages. I have declined to offer an opinion because I wasn’t sure. Also, I figured supply and demand would answer the question. And most of the time, those fundamentals did. When things tilted toward a shortage, subsequent events relieved the situation – and no shortage materialized.

    Stephen Miller

    Stephen Miller started his career in the scrap metal industry in 1978 at Luria Brothers in Cleveland. Over the last 40-plus years, he has worked in all capacities in the trading business. He has had positions in both domestic and international scrap trading. In addition to scrap, Miller was at the forefront of the pig iron trade and established a pig iron distribution company under the name of Ferrosource, Inc. Most recently, Miller has concentrated on the scrap export market and regularly does consulting for several companies in the industry.

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