NADCA on Trade

One of NADCA’s actions to help promote fair trade for its membership has been to become a committee member of the National Association of Manufacturers (NAM) Council of Manufacturing Associations (CMA). While the CMA falls under the NAM umbrella, it is run as an individual organization, has separate objectives and a different membership. CMA’s members are composed of more than 350 manufacturing associations. The group’s mission is to enhance the competitiveness of manufacturers and to improve American living standards by shaping a legislative and regulatory environment conducive to U.S. economic growth and to increase understanding among policymakers, the media and the public about the importance of manufacturing to America’s economic strength.

By becoming a part of a larger organization, NADCA has the opportunity to give die casters more exposure, by educating and publicizing the problems it is having to the general public and political leaders. Within the past two years, CMA has issued three different reports describing the state of manufacturing and the changes and difficulties the industry faces, in an effort to make these concerns tangible.

“NADCA helped underwrite three white papers because we believe that in order to logically defend a position, we need facts to support that position,” stated NADCA

President Daniel Twarog. “These reports provide the undisputed facts that show the impact that manufacturing has on the economy, the impact it has on America, as well as the costs that manufactures incur to operate legally.”

Securing America’s Future: The Case for a Strong Manufacturing Base

An independent white paper on the importance of manufacturing and the impact that foreign trade has on the industry was the first report released. The main purpose of it is to emphasize the importance that manufacturing

represents to the entire U.S. economy. The study, Securing America’s Future: The Case for a Strong Manufacturing Base, was written by noted economist and former Council of Economic Advisors member Joel Popkin. The study describes how manufacturing lies at the center of an interlocking innovation process with many spillovers boosting the non-manufacturing economy. The findings in this report call out to Congress and the Administration for sustained action to enhance America’s manufacturing base. The full report is available online on at www.diecasting.org/trade/Popkin.pdf.

How Structural Costs Imposed on U.S. Manufacturers Harm Workers and Threaten Competitiveness

The next report released, How Structural Costs Imposed on U.S. Manufacturers Harm Workers and Threaten Competitiveness was researched and written by Jeremy A. Leonard, of the Economic Consultant Manufacturers Alliance/MAPI. The article describes reasons why American manufacturing is losing its competitive edge. For example, operating costs in the United States continue to escalate, in order to provide workplace safety and maintain environmental standards, among other costs.

This report is an important tool in the manufacturing campaign as the predicate for why state and federal policies must be changed. Future American living standards are at stake and elected officials hold the key. The complete report can be found at www.nam.org/costs.

The Facts About Modern Manufacturing

This newly updated resource tells the manufacturer’s story — the industry’s contributions to our economy and our standard of living and the critical challenges it is facing — using charts, economic data and company profiles in an attractive and accessible four-color format.

The Facts About Modern Manufacturing is an important part of NAM’s arsenal of information about manufacturing, which remains the foundation of our nation’s economy and its most important source of creativity, innovation and productivity. By highlighting mainly official U.S. government statistics in this publication, manufacturing leaders are armed with the ammunition they need to help elected officials, the press and educators better understand the enormous contributions of manufacturing to U.S. prosperity. The report may be found online: www.nam.org/s_nam/sec.asp?CID=89&DID=87.

While the purpose of these three reports is to help provide a base of information so the manufacturing industry can provide factual information to the government on its current status, it is also important for the manufacturers to read as well so they too can be well versed on all of the issues. By working together to provide a unified message, we can ensure that there will be a manufacturing future in the U.S.