See this video on the economics of shipbuilding: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Gk61ginOqo https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Gk61ginOqo Assembly of civilian m

See this video on the economics of shipbuilding: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Gk61ginOqo https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Gk61ginOqo Assembly of civilian merchant ships is a notoriously low-margin industry (as opposed to manufacturing of engines/propellers/control systems). You could heavily subsidize it (by protectionism measures and/or by juicing up your Navy) like the US does in the name of strategic importance, but be prepared to pay heavily for it. If you want to preserve shipbuilding capabilities for military reasons, then chasing after the Asian shipbuilding countries may not be the most efficient way of achieving this, i.e. it may be better to just invest into building of military ships and manufacturing of higher-margin components without bothering with the low-margin assembly stuff.