In a recent post on the Economic Policy Insitute’s Working Economics blog, economist Robert E. Scott praised President Obama for laying out a blueprint for rebuilding the economy through manufacturing, but noted one glaring omission from the president’s plan: tackling China’s cheating:

“In his State of the Union Speech last night, President Obama outlined a blueprint for rebuilding the economy the right way, by rebuilding American manufacturing, expanding clean energy investments and by fixing our broken infrastructure. Kudos to him for continuing to highlight this important issue, but he failed to mention the main cause of our manufacturing woes in the first place: currency manipulation.”

Scott is right. Though the administration’s blueprint offers some solid plans for revitalizing our manufacturing sector, it’s time for President Obama to get tough on China’s currency manipulation. Though he did discuss plans to tackle many of China’s unfair trade practices, such as illegal subsidies to domestic and foreign manufacturers, the president should have focused more on the undervalued Yuan, which remains a major roadblock to a sustained manufacturing recovery.

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