Hoyer Discusses "Make It In America" at The Hill's "Smart Work" Forum

WASHINGTON, DC - House Democratic Whip Steny H. Hoyer (MD) attended The Hill’s “Smart Work: Manufacturing in the Digital Age” forum last week and discussed how Democrats are updating the “Make It In America” plan to address how the economy has changed as a result of new technologies and innovations, and what it means for America’s manufacturing sector. Below are excerpts from the interview and a link to the video: 

Click here to watch the video.

On Updating the Make It In America Plan to Adapt to Today’s Economy

“It really is a starkly fast-changing economy. We’re in a sharing economy, that we talk a lot about. We’re in an economy that maybe doesn’t produce a cup, but produces ones and zeros. We’re in a changing employment environment. Uber is a perfect example. They have 1.5 million people that work with Uber, all are perceived to be independent contractors, a very different relationship. That’s a challenge for public policy, it’s a challenge for employees, and, of course, a challenge for employers, as well. So we just had a hearing, a series of hearings in the past year, in which we talked about how in this new, changing economy, it’s still ‘Make It In America,’ but ‘Make It In America’ may mean different things. Rather than just producing a cup, it may be producing apps, or it may be producing software, which you don’t think of as manufacturing. What do you need to do? Obviously education is key. Everybody that testified, whether they were manufacturers, or Members [of Congress], or people who were involved in building economies and local governments, they all talked about education, the need for a skilled workforce. Not only a basic education but skills education. We talked about investment and infrastructure. We’ve talked about taxes and regulations. Obviously those are big decisions when somebody is saying I’m going to invest money to expand here in America or go overseas and to also bring jobs back.”

On Continuing to Focus on the Make It In America Plan

“I think we need to continue. The Administration has had a focus, you know we have manufacturing centers of excellence… There has been a great focus. And we adopted a bill from Congressman [Dan] Lipinksi from Chicago which said look, we need a plan, we need a plan for what is necessary to create the environment to expand manufacturing. So I’m hopeful that we can come together, Republicans and Democrats, because ‘Make It In America’ is a great agenda in the sense that it’s not a partisan agenda, it’s not a philosophical agenda. It’s a pragmatic agenda that both Republicans and Democrats, conservatives and liberals, all say we want to create jobs and have a better growing economy. Well ‘Make It In America’ is about that. It’s not an ideologically dividing agenda, it’s a cooperative agenda."