Make It In America

Make It In America is about two things: rebuilding our manufacturing sector, so that we make products here in America and sell them here and around the world; and creating good jobs, so that more families are able to Make It In America.

House Democrats just introduced our Make It In America agenda for the 112th Congress.  It focuses on: keeping America competitive; supporting small businesses; investing in infrastructure to support the flow of commerce; clean energy jobs; innovative education policy; smart tax policy; and smart regulations.

Americans inherently know that manufacturing is critical to our nation. It’s not just that manufacturing creates well-paying middle-class jobs or fosters innovation. We’ve always been proud to be a country that makes things.

We want more success stories like General Motors’s recent announcement that they will be adding and preserving over 4,000 jobs across the U.S.

The Make It In America agenda will help do that by restoring making things to a central place in our economy—by building an environment in which American manufacturers can grow and create jobs, and making sure our businesses are competitive across the world.

Make It In America also means recommitting ourselves to the future of America’s middle class by ensuring that we are out-educating, out-innovating, and out-building our competitors.

We must cut wasteful spending and restore fiscal responsibility, while making priority investments to keep our nation competitive.

Many of our Make It In America bills that passed in the last Congress have won bipartisan support. And I believe we can win bipartisan support on many pieces of our new Make It In America agenda that we’ve recently introduced.

This Congress, Democrats continue to advance the “Make It In America” agenda, a plan to support job creation today and in the future by encouraging businesses to innovate and make products in the US and sell them to the world through strengthening our infrastructure and prioritizing investments in key areas like education and energy innovation. This effort builds on House Democrats' actions to create jobs and continue growing the economy and focuses on investing in key priorities while cutting wasteful spending.

Since the 1970’s, manufacturing has been in a steep decline, shrinking from 20 million jobs in 1979 to fewer than 12 million jobs today. However, 2010 and 2011 have seen a resurgence of the manufacturing sector that we need to build on.

  • Manufacturing in the U.S. expanded in March at close to the fastest pace in almost seven years, and has seen 21 straight months of growth.
  • In 2010, the manufacturing sector added 152,000 jobs.
  • Manufacturing employment increases in 2010 and 2011 mark the longest stretch of growth since 1997.

Job losses in the manufacturing sector contributed to the stagnation of the middle class over the past decade—from 2002 to 2008, the median household income fell by $2,000. Democrats are focused on reversing this trend and rebuilding the middle class by making sound investments in:

  • Our ability to out-educate our competitors and ensure we have a competitive workforce;
  • Our ability to out-innovate our competitors and keep America the world leader in cutting-edge fields and technology;
  • And our ability to out-build our competitor and strengthen infrastructure so that we can move products quickly and cheaply.

This is a comprehensive effort that includes:

  • Investing in infrastructure and supporting the flow of commerce
  • Keeping America competitive
  • Supporting small businesses
  • Smart tax policy
  • Clean energy jobs
  • Innovative education policy

By focusing on these critical investments in our future, we can create an environment that:

  • Creates good-paying middle class jobs;
  • Boosts America’s global competitiveness;
  • Helps to spur growth in other areas of the economy that support manufacturing.

A number of Make It In America bills have already been signed into law and are helping to foster an environment that encourages manufacturers to innovate, grow, keep and create good jobs in the U.S.:   

  • U.S. Manufacturing Enhancement Act: Makes it cheaper for American companies to obtain the materials they need to manufacture goods.
  • Protecting American Patents: Helps the Patent Office to begin to unclog the backlog –totaling about 1.2 million pending applications – by giving the agency access to more of the fees it collects so that patent applications can continue to be processed and innovative ideas can continue to move to market.
  • Preventing Outsourcing: Legislation prevents the outsourcing of U.S. jobs by closing tax loopholes that encourage companies to send U.S. jobs overseas.
  • Small Business Jobs Act: Expands much needed lending to millions of small businesses and offers tax incentives to help small businesses grow, hire, and fuel our economy, without adding a dime to the deficit.
  • Energy Jobs and Training for Veterans Act: Provides grants for programs to provide on-the-job training, apprenticeship, real experience, and long-term employment in all energy fields.
  • COMPETES Act: Establishes innovative technology federal loan guarantees for small- and medium-sized manufacturers and invests in science, technology, engineering, and math education.