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Trump won’t bring manufacturing jobs back to US with investments like SoftBank
Trump won’t bring manufacturing jobs back to US with investments like SoftBank
By Hu Weijia
Source:Global Times
Published: 2016/12/8 0:13:40
US President-elect Donald Trump has said that the promise from Japan's SoftBank to invest $50 billion in the US that will create 50,000 jobs was "a direct result of his election win" according to Reuters. However, the question is whether that kind of political lobbying can bring back real jobs for American workers.
The latest Talent Shortage Survey by human resource services provider Manpower Group reported that 46 percent of US employers have difficulties filling jobs due to lack of available talent, a significant increase from 32 percent in 2015. As the shortage of workers escalates, the country needs to increasing investment in cultivating employees rather than attracting capital into high-end industries.
We do believe that some multinational firms in those high-end sectors will increase investment in the US under political pressure from Trump, but they may find it difficult to recruit enough skilled workers. Foreign workers already play a vital role in filling the talent gap. In light of this, Trump's efforts to bring jobs back will perhaps do nothing but boost domestic demand for high-tech workers.
The problem facing the US now is a lack of middle- and low-end manufacturing jobs to help drive down the unemployment rate, but it remains questionable whether SoftBank's investment will be a solution. The Japan-based enterprise, which has been making an push into artificial intelligence, robotics and the Internet of Things, said it planned to invest into new startup companies in the US, making it easy to imagine that some middle and low-end manufacturing jobs will be cut if SoftBank's investment provides an impetus to the development of the local robotics sector.
It seems that SoftBank's investment won't bring back jobs to the US. More worrying is that the president-elect's eye-raising rhetoric on issues like trade won't turn out well either.
The US-based website Business Insider reported that on Tuesday night in North Carolina Trump said that the US should view trade "almost as a war" and defeat the enemy on jobs. However, the president-elect may forget to evaluate China's fighting capacity if he sparks a trade war. China has overtaken the US to become the world's largest trading nation and has become an important exporting market for a host of American firms, including Apple. The shares gained by American companies in the Chinese market could serve as a weapon in the hand of Beijing if there is a trade war with Washington.
The author is a reporter with the Global Times. bizopinion@globaltimes.com.cn
http://www.globaltimes.cn/content/1022490.shtml
