Priorities
Reindustrializing America
Liberalizing trade with China led to the destruction of our nation’s industrial core. It annihilated an entire sector of work, severely diminishing our nation’s manufacturing base and eliminating millions of stable, productive jobs. The ripple effects across families and communities are shocking. And it left America unable to produce strategically important goods.
America didn’t deindustrialize overnight. Instead, it was a decades-long process built on a failed, bipartisan consensus that believed an integrated global economy and increased market efficiency would lead to economic prosperity. And it did, for the stock market. But not for the communities hollowed by global trade.
America didn’t deindustrialize overnight. Instead, it was a decades-long process built on a failed, bipartisan consensus that believed an integrated global economy and increased market efficiency would lead to economic prosperity. And it did, for the stock market. But not for the communities hollowed by global trade.
In many ways, the last three decades were a complete rejection of America’s founding traditions. From early days, there was a desire to ensure American prosperity was not dependent on any other country. To achieve that commonsense goal, America needed a diverse industrial economy. It was that industrial capacity that allowed America to win World War II and lay the groundwork for unprecedented levels of innovation.
As that capacity faded with globalization, so too did the benefits that came with an economy that makes things. The financialization of America’s economy – while great for corporate profits and glitzy stock market gains – did little to secure the blessings of liberty for America’s working families.
It is time for a 21st-century pro-American industrial policy. That will require a fundamental shift in how policymakers approach domestic investment, federal incentives (and disincentives), Wall Street, and our economic relationship with China.
It is time for a 21st-century pro-American industrial policy. That will require a fundamental shift in how policymakers approach domestic investment, federal incentives (and disincentives), Wall Street, and our economic relationship with China.
