according to the Milwaukee Business Journal, president Obama is unveiling a 500 million dollar program to improve American manufacturing capabilities. Here is the description:
"According to the White House, investments will be made in the following key areas: building domestic manufacturing capabilities in critical national security industries; reducing the time to get advanced materials into products; establishing U.S. leadership in next-generation robotics; increasing the energy efficiency in manufacturing; and developing new technologies that will dramatically reduce the time required to design, build, and test manufactured goods."
I have to wonder what all this means. will there be research in these areas that will be shared with American businesses? Will there be plant construction that will enhance these areas? Will there be grants to businesses (probably Obama friends) that will be used for these purposes. These three alternatives are quite different. Research, if it is validly done, might actually help the economy. Investment in plants and equipment will be positive, but it will be so small as to not really matter. Grants to individual companies will just be another payoff to those who meet the profile that the government wants to reward. That profile usually depends more on ones political loyalties than on the content of what one does.
A major program like this implemented in 2009 would have borne fruit and helped the economy by now. Of course, nothing was done then other than a massive, wasteful and useless stimulus program. Now that all the money has been spent, we are getting possible useful items in tiny amounts.
Where is the leadership?
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