‘Made In America’ Should Not Mean ‘Made Under Injustice’

The Biden administration is making historic investments in U.S. manufacturing–through the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (IIJA), the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA), the Creating Helpful Incentives to Produce Semiconductors (CHIPS) and Science Act, and by increasing domestic content requirements under Buy America laws. These investments are important, as the disappearance of U.S. manufacturing has caused unemployment and poverty in many communities.

But while “made in America” might mean more domestic jobs, that doesn’t mean these jobs will be good ones. There’s a misguided, and often xenophobic, notion that factories overseas are to blame for most worker exploitation and disappearing U.S. jobs. The truth is that these things happen right in our own backyards.

Take Hyundai, for example. The Korean automaker is emerging as a big player in the electric vehicle game, even riding the bumper of Tesla. But Reuters earlier this year found children as young as 12 working at two of the company’s suppliers in Alabama. That’s right–12 years old.

Companies like Hyundai that stand to benefit from those recent federal investments and will be the major players of the green economy need to set the bar now for what it looks like to be a good U.S. employer. And right now, with evidence of child labor, that bar is on the floor.

In many ways, Hyundai’s practices represent many of the factors contributing to a “race to the bottom” in U.S. manufacturing. Like many other corporations, Hyundai was awarded millions in tax incentives to set up shop in Alabama, a state notorious for giving away billions in subsidies to companies with questionable return on investment. (Disclosure: the author of this study is a former Alabama legislator and employed by Jobs to Move America.) Many global companies set up shop in the U.S. South to take advantage of lax regulation and fiercely anti-union environments. It’s disgusting that our tax dollars could be supporting child labor, a practice that supposedly ended in the 1930s.

SMART, one of the Hyundai suppliers that employed children, has defended itself by saying it uses temporary work agencies to find workers. This is another problem plaguing U.S. manufacturing—many companies use temp agencies to sidestep paying benefits or allowing workers to unionize.

Not only is the precarity of temp work troubling for an industry once known for good, long-term union jobs, but having a constant stream of new employees in physically demanding manufacturing jobs using dangerous equipment is a recipe for an unsafe work environment. (In fact, according to Reuters, the SMART plant has repeatedly violated health and safety regulations.)

The ones disproportionately impacted by this dangerous temp work are Black workers, who make up 33% percent of temp workers in manufacturing and warehousing occupations, despite making up only 15.5% of the overall manufacturing and warehousing workforce.

Since temp workers aren’t technically employees of the company, these companies act like they don’t exist—yet these workers are still making the products that contribute to profits. Employers need to take responsibility for abuse happening at any place that makes their products.

The “race to the bottom” in U.S. manufacturing is most literal in the government procurement process, where private companies like Hyundai win contracts to supply vehicles to government agencies without any requirements for equity or good jobs. We need to encourage public agencies to take a more proactive approach to incentivizing good jobs and equitable, safe workplaces as part of the bidding process. Some call this common sense practice “purchasing for the common good.” This would simply require public agencies purchasing or subsidizing clean technology to award extra points for committing to high-road jobs standards, like family-sustaining wages and benefits. The U.S. Employment Plan provides a framework for incorporating equity into government purchasing, and it’s been used by several major public agencies. We need to incorporate our values into our public decisions and demand that companies provide a real return on our taxpayer investment.

Fortunately, there are companies that are setting the standard for how “made in America” should look. My organization, Jobs to Move America, has negotiated community benefits agreements (CBAs) with major global electric vehicle manufacturers BYD, Proterra and, most recently, New Flyer of America. At BYD, for instance, the CBA resulted in a first-of-its kind training program in electric vehicle manufacturing. Not only were participants taught how to be successful at BYD, they can take these skills to other EV companies. BYD is a competitor of Tesla, proving you can do things the right way while also being competitive in the EV market.

Rebuilding U.S. manufacturing will not only make us more resilient to the crises that have become so common these days, but it also has the potential to provide well-paying jobs to people who face barriers in completing traditional education. But manufacturers must do things the right way, or else “made in America” will start to mean “made under injustice.”