WASHINGTON (AP) – The Biden administration is taking a key step in ensuring that federal dollars support US construction – issuing demands on how projects funded by the $ 1 trillion bipartisan infrastructure package will provide construction material. their. The new guidance, issued Monday, requires that the material purchased – whether it be a bridge, freeway, water pipe or broadband Internet – be made in the United States. However, the rules also set out a procedure to remove these requirements in the event that there are not enough domestic producers or the material costs too much, with the aim of issuing fewer derogations over time as US capacity increases. “There will be additional job opportunities in the manufacturing sector,” said Celeste Drake, director of Made in America at the White House Office of Management and Budget. President Joe Biden hopes to create more jobs, ease supply chain pressures and reduce dependence on China and other nations with interests diverging from those of America. With inflation at a 40-year high in the run-up to the 2022 midterm elections, he bets that more domestic production will eventually ease price pressures to soften Republicans’ attacks that the $ 1.9 trillion coronavirus relief package has pushed up prices by as much as $ 1 trillion. “From day one, every step I have taken to rebuild our economy has been guided by one principle: Made in America,” Biden said Thursday in Greensboro, North Carolina. “We need a federal government that is not just a slot machine in the American market, but is actually taking action.” Biden said the government’s about $ 700 billion a year in goods supplies is supposed to give priority to U.S. suppliers, but regulations dating back to the 1930s have either been reduced or enforced in ways that mask the use of foreign imports. . The administration could not say what percentage of the building material for the existing infrastructure is US-made, even though the federal government is already spending $ 350 billion on construction this year. The new guidelines will allow government officials to know how much dollars are going to US workers and factories. Built into the bipartisan infrastructure package that became law last November was a requirement that from May 14 “none of the funds” available to federal agencies for projects can be spent “unless all used iron, steel, industrial products and the building materials in the project are produced in the United States “. This according to Monday’s 17-page guide. The guidance includes three standards for removing these requirements: if the market “is not in the public interest”. if the necessary materials are not produced “in sufficient and reasonably available quantities or of satisfactory quality” or if US materials increase the cost of a project by more than 25%. U.S. manufacturers are down about 170,000 jobs from the 12.8 million factory jobs in 2019, as manufacturing jobs began to decline before the pandemic began. However, the US has 6.9 million fewer manufacturing jobs compared to its peak in 1979, a loss caused by outsourcing and automation. Getting more industrial jobs will likely mean adding more factories and assembly lines – as manufacturers operate at 78.7% capacity, which the Federal Reserve notes is above the all-time average. Josh Boak, The Associated Press
