Tryston Taylor - Persuation Effect Project
Proposal Regarding American Manufacturing
Implementing a solution to the current state of American manufacturing is not an easy undertaking, the current state of manufacturing in America is dismal at best especially when the job market is taken into account; several key factors must be addressed before any real progress can be made in making America less dependent on foreign labor and more effective economically as a nation. First and foremost economic policy in America, such as NAFTA, regarding companies and manufacturing must change in order for manufacturing to develop and begin growing based on company interest and investment. Second companies must establish manufacturing jobs in local markets in order to stimulate the local economies of those markets, stimulating the product market without stimulating the job market creates vast economic problems in the long term. Lastly a pipeline of progression must be made with the newly created manufacturing jobs, this pipeline is designed to create skilled workers from the least skilled and newly hired employees. Without economic policy change regarding companies manufacturing will become a dying sector given enough time, without manufacturing you do not have enough jobs to stimulate the economy and will likely only result in creating a worse situation for America economically.
Economic policy regarding companies in America allows companies to decide on the cheapest work force that they can get, it allows them to completely disregard the job economy and list product prices higher due to overseas labor and shipping, this problem is highly attributed to being caused by NAFTA. NAFTA has affected the world markets in many ways, from Mexico and its manufacturing to China and its manufacturing sector, America has received the short end of the stick though, America lost manufacturing jobs and in doing so adversely affected the economy as seen in figure A (Kondo). Solving the economic policy that adversely affects the manufacturing sector in America is the most difficult part, NAFTA must be dealt with in some way, several solutions range from repealing NAFTA entirely addendums to the free trade agreement, and or instituting tariffs and restrictions on companies who outsource and requiring them to manufacture and sell in the same local market. The best solution makes manufacturing in America worthwhile to companies and does not increase product prices, thus the best solution would be to get rid of NAFTA entirely and renegotiate our trade agreements so the manufacturing worker is not bypassed in the America and product prices do not increase. Once the economic policy is dealt with companies must play their part in getting jobs back into local markets and stimulating the job market, without company involvement nothing progresses past this point.
Implementing a solution to the current state of American manufacturing is not an easy undertaking, the current state of manufacturing in America is dismal at best especially when the job market is taken into account; several key factors must be addressed before any real progress can be made in making America less dependent on foreign labor and more effective economically as a nation. First and foremost economic policy in America, such as NAFTA, regarding companies and manufacturing must change in order for manufacturing to develop and begin growing based on company interest and investment. Second companies must establish manufacturing jobs in local markets in order to stimulate the local economies of those markets, stimulating the product market without stimulating the job market creates vast economic problems in the long term. Lastly a pipeline of progression must be made with the newly created manufacturing jobs, this pipeline is designed to create skilled workers from the least skilled and newly hired employees. Without economic policy change regarding companies manufacturing will become a dying sector given enough time, without manufacturing you do not have enough jobs to stimulate the economy and will likely only result in creating a worse situation for America economically.
Economic policy regarding companies in America allows companies to decide on the cheapest work force that they can get, it allows them to completely disregard the job economy and list product prices higher due to overseas labor and shipping, this problem is highly attributed to being caused by NAFTA. NAFTA has affected the world markets in many ways, from Mexico and its manufacturing to China and its manufacturing sector, America has received the short end of the stick though, America lost manufacturing jobs and in doing so adversely affected the economy as seen in figure A (Kondo). Solving the economic policy that adversely affects the manufacturing sector in America is the most difficult part, NAFTA must be dealt with in some way, several solutions range from repealing NAFTA entirely addendums to the free trade agreement, and or instituting tariffs and restrictions on companies who outsource and requiring them to manufacture and sell in the same local market. The best solution makes manufacturing in America worthwhile to companies and does not increase product prices, thus the best solution would be to get rid of NAFTA entirely and renegotiate our trade agreements so the manufacturing worker is not bypassed in the America and product prices do not increase. Once the economic policy is dealt with companies must play their part in getting jobs back into local markets and stimulating the job market, without company involvement nothing progresses past this point.
Companies in general need to be manufacturing commercial products inside local markets, for example: what is manufactured in China is sold in the Asian market due to the laws that require companies to manufacture and sell products in local markets (Hedley). RE-shoring jobs is paramount to fixing not only the job economy but also the economy in general, for every one job in manufacturing four more employees are hired elsewhere (nam.org) and for every dollar spent in manufacturing 1.81 dollars are added to the economy; this is the highest multiplier of any economic sector as seen in Figure B with a study conducted two years ago the multiplier has since grown (nam.org). Companies must realize that if they invest into an economy not only with money but also by creating jobs they can create even more revenue than they currently do, this does not mean we can tax them into the ground however, bringing back jobs must be beneficial for the company or they will never bring back jobs. The best solution to bring back jobs to America is to appeal to a company’s interests, by giving a company reason to manufacture in local markets it will stimulate the company and economy at the same time, policy must change so its beneficial for the company and then jobs should come back naturally as it will align with the interests of the company. Training skilled workers is not an easy task, but if you have natural progression from being a newly hired employee to becoming a skilled worker then the skill gap decreases very quickly over time.
Developing a pipeline of progression in manufacturing in order to fix the skill gap that is present in the job market is paramount to fixing America’s current economic predicament, by creating natural progression through a company by progressively training employees as they progress via promotion or reassignment will fix the skill gap and create jobs thus stimulating both the product and job markets of the economy. The current manufacturing sector lacks a natural progression that trains people for the jobs that are currently available, this has created a skill gap that isn’t being filled and is causing the job market to suffer and in tandem is causing the economy to suffer, the skill gap can be seen in Figure C. Creating jobs in the United States by appealing to company interest will fix a portion of the economic situation that America is involved in; bringing back low skill jobs and then training those employees over time will result in those employees taking on the higher skill based jobs that currently are not being filled. The solution in short to creating the pipeline of progression is to bring back jobs, train the new employees, as time progresses train them for new positions or help them get higher education for the more skill based jobs thus shrinking the skill gap and filling the jobs we currently can’t fill. Manufacturing is not an easy issue to solve, it requires much more than a simple fix on a company’s part, or a tax or tariff on the governments part, it requires both company and government to create a condition where company and consumer benefit which in turn benefits the government.
Solving the issue of manufacturing in America is complex, tedious, and crucial to the survival of the American economy. Economic policy must change either by the repealing or renegotiation of NAFTA and other trade agreements. Companies must bring back jobs into local product markets and stimulate the job market, if policy changes and benefits companies more than outsourcing jobs then companies will naturally bring jobs back to local markets and if companies are required to produce products and sell them in local markets then it will increase competition in local markets. Lastly the skill gap must be addressed by creating a pipeline within manufacturing companies that allow employees to be trained and progress to the more skill based jobs that are currently not being filled by the job market. Solving this issue is possible, it requires cooperation on the government and corporate sides as well as some very strict conditions that must be met or else we risk a collapse, but if the current system continues a collapse is inevitable, this can be solved but we need to invest more than our money and words into our nation. Donald Trump has mentioned these issues specifically especially regarding NAFTA but words do not mean action, we will have to wait and see if the new presidency changes these issues for the better.