Manufacturing Revitalization and Retention

There is lots of talk and writing about the loss of good manufacturing jobs and the impact on workers, families and communities. But, public policy answers for dealing with these issues frequently lack specificity. Policy experts that are involved with current efforts to grapple with these key issues are assembled on this webpage.

• Greening the Economy: Bob Baugh, Director of the AFL-CIO's Industrial Union Council, gave his presentation on how green energy and green jobs can support and spread high road manufacturing and construction jobs. Click Here.
• Building Chicago as a High Performance Manufacturing Region: This presentation by Dan Swinney of Chicago Manufacturing Renaissance Council shows how joint efforts of employers, labor, and public sector are assisting with maintaining and building Chicago's manufacturing workforce. CMRC's Austin Polytech High School, a newly opened public high school designed and linked with high road manufacturing employers in a unique partnership, is featured. Click Here.
• Pennsylvania's Industry Partnership Strategy: Steve Herzenberg of Keystone Research Center provides an overview of Pennsylania's workforce development strategy. Industry partnerships in the Commonwealth focus on identifying industry sectors and planning training and workforce development programs around specific needs of employers and growing occupations in those industries. Click Here.
• Building Manufacturing to Help Our Economy: Case Western Reserve University professor of economics Susan Helper presented a review of how manufacturing benefits the overall economy and policies that can assist manufacturing. Click Here. Professor Helper recently produced a valuable paper on manufacturing for Economic Policy Institute's Shared Prosperity Project. For the EPI paper, Click Here.
• Manufacturing Better Manufacturing in Michigan, by Dan Luria, Vice President, Michigan Manufacturing Technology Center. Presentation to a NELP roundtable held in Lansing in March 2007 concerning the identification and support of good small manufacturing firms through state and regional policies. Click Here.