So no problem is forever. In the long run, as already noted, corporate profits grow very much in line with sales increases. The relative pace of the two varies occasionally, but in the long run, the divergences cancel out. The first immutable fact about individual companies' performance is that there are good, bad, and indifferent businesses, and firms in various industries usually perform well, poorly, or so-so because of the basic characteristics of their industries. Among the key characteristics are the age and maturity of the industry and its competitiveness.
Steel is the epitome of a bad industry.
It's plagued by almost no demand growth and intense price competition caused by worldwide overcapacity. On the other end of the scale is the pharmaceutical industry. In between is a broad spectrum of industry characteristics, some netting out on the positive side, a number mediocre, and others rather negative. These fundamentals change only slowly over time so the investor can gauge quite accurately how much of a tide is running in favor of different businesses. Within almost every industry there are leaders and laggards.