Jobs

Running head: Jobs

Jobs

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Jobs

Introduction

The United States is the largest manufacturing economy in the world because it produces 18% of the products that are manufactured globally. In the United States, manufacturing supports around 17 million jobs, and manufacturing is what drives America even today (Terry, 2013).

The most recent recession has hit the manufacturing sector in the US very hard, and new layers of red tape and more tax burdens are driving more manufacturing jobs out of the US to overseas destinations thus affecting the United States global competitiveness. Tax burdens on the manufacturing sector in the United States have made manufacturing in the US more expensive than elsewhere in places like China (Terry, 2013). Added to this is the fact that the trade unions in the US are driving up manufacturing costs by increasing the pay and benefits of workers in unionized companies. This has resulted in unionized companies facing more financial losses than non-unionized companies, thus forcing unionized companies to move out their manufacturing bases to places like China (Sherk, 2009).

Employer-friendly unions can bring back manufacturing jobs to the US, and this can be achieved through changing the the attitudes, policies and practices of most trade unions in the US.

How Can Employer-Friendly Unions Bring Back Manufacturing Jobs To The US?

Most businesses run on profit motive, and to achieve greater profits, companies have to cut costs and increase production and sales. It is only when production costs become higher that companies think of moving out to other destinations where production costs such as, labor costs and material costs are cheap. The factors that drive-up manufacturing costs in the US are formation of labor cartels that drive-up wages (Sherk, 2009), increased tax burdens (Terry, 2013), inability to reward deserving employees, and breeding of...