How many auto parts jobs are there in Maryland?

The answer is more than 9,000.

Alliance for American Manufacturing (AAM) Executive Director Scott Paul has published an op-ed in the Baltimore Sun that explains why Maryland auto parts jobs are at risk due to heavily subsized competition from China.

It's not just Maryland jobs that are at risk, though.  Paul says that China is utilizing massive subsidies, in violation of trade agreements, to undercut U.S. auto parts producers:

China is not penetrating our market the old-fashioned way, by outcompeting us. Instead, Beijing has pumped $27 billion of subsidies into its auto-parts sector, with an additional $10 billion planned. And through policies that have been documented in great detail by our own government and outside investigators, China blocks our exports of autos and auto parts while favoring its own industry, in direct violation of the commitments it made to free markets when it joined the World Trade Organization.

Paul says that this heavy susidization, combined with trade barriers, is helping China to seize market share in the U.S.  What's needed to stabilize the U.S. auto parts industry is for the president to "initiate a trade action against China to stop its auto-parts subsidies, open its market and grow jobs here."

Click here to read the full op-ed in the Baltimore Sun.