America has lost more than 60,000 manufacturing facilities and 5.5 million manufacturing jobs since 2000
President-elect Donald Trump announced a $7 million incentive plan today that prompted Carrier to keep 1,100 manufacturing and management jobs in America.
The president-elect campaigned heavily on bringing manufacturing jobs back to America and often cited Carrier as an example of jobs moving to Mexico after the company announced last March it was moving approximately 2,000 jobs from Indiana to Monterrey.
Carrier, owned by United Technologies Corp., received months of pressure from local officials and the United Steelworkers before working out the incentive deal with the next administration.
Said Alliance for American Manufacturing (AAM) President Scott Paul:
"Any analysis of the Carrier deal must put workers front and center.
"More than 2,000 jobs and $108 million in economic activity would have been lost had Carrier moved all its operations to Mexico. Now, hundreds of Indiana workers will now keep good jobs, preserving their place in the middle class. While inducements and high-level interventions aren’t the most efficient ways to keep jobs here, they’re sometimes absolutely necessary. For another example of this, look back to the unqualified success of the 2009 Obama administration auto rescue.
"But the Carrier deal is only a bandage on the economic wounds in our industrial heartland. Over the past 16 years, America has lost more than 60,000 manufacturing facilities and 5.5 million manufacturing jobs since 2000.
"Not all of those jobs can be reclaimed, but smarter policies will give factory workers a brighter future. A tougher trade policy, a tax code that incentivizes reshoring jobs and production, investments in infrastructure, research, and training are all urgently needed."America has manufacturing know-how, abundant energy resources, a culture of entrepreneurship, a strong homegrown consumer market, and access to amazing innovation. Smarter policies will help us compete.
"We know these issues enjoy bipartisan support among voters, and they should be the focus of Congress and the Trump administration in 2017."