Obama Blocks Chinese Wind Farms Purchase Near Navy Base

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EA-18G Growlers like this one are tested at the Navy base in Oregon near where a Chinese firm intended to buy wind turbine farms. | Photo Credit: Paul Farley / U.S. Navy

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JULIE PACE
9/28/2012
WASHINGTON — Citing national security risks, President Barack Obama on Friday blocked a Chinese company from owning four wind farm projects in northern Oregon near a Navy base where the U.S. military flies unmanned drones and electronic-warfare planes on training missions.
It was the first time in 22 years that a U.S. president has blocked such a foreign business deal.

Obama’s decision was likely to be another irritant in the increasingly tense economic relationship between the U.S. and China. It also comes against an election-year backdrop of intense criticism from Republican presidential challenger Mitt Romney, who accuses Obama of not being tough enough with China.

In his decision, Obama ordered Ralls Corp., a company owned by Chinese nationals, to divest its interest in the wind farms it purchased earlier this year near the Naval Weapons Systems Training Facility in Boardman, Ore.

The case reached the president’s desk after the Committee on Foreign Investments in the United States, known as CFIUS, determined there was no way to address the national security risks posed by the Chinese company’s purchases. Only the president has final authority to prohibit a transaction.

The administration would not say what risks the wind farm purchases presented. The Treasury Department said CFIUS made its recommendation to Obama after receiving an analysis of the potential threats from the Office of the Director of National Intelligence.

The military has acknowledged that it used the Oregon Naval facility to test unmanned drones and the EA-18G “Growler.” The electronic warfare aircraft accompanies U.S. fighter bombers on missions and protectively jams enemy radar, destroying them with missiles along the way.

At the Oregon site, the planes fly as low as 200 feet and nearly 300 miles per hour.

The last time a president used the law to block a transaction was 1990, when President George H.W. Bush voided the sale of Mamco Manufacturing to a Chinese agency.

In 2006, President George W. Bush approved a CFIUS case involving the merger of Alcatel and Lucent Technologies.

The Treasury Department said in a statement that Obama’s decision is specific to this transaction and does not set a precedent for other foreign direct investment in the U.S. by China or any other country.

China’s trade advantage over the U.S. has emerged as a key issue in the final weeks of the presidential campaign. Romney accuses Obama of failing to stand up to Beijing, while the president criticizes the GOP nominee for investing part of his personal fortune in China and outsourcing jobs there while he ran the private equity firm Bain Capital.

Both campaigns are running ads on China in battleground states, especially Ohio, where workers in the manufacturing industry have been hard-hit by outsourcing.

Obama, in an interview Wednesday with The Plain Dealer of Cleveland, said the U.S. must push hard against Beijing but “not go out of our way to embarrass” China.

“We’re not interested in triggering an all-out trade war that would damage both economies,” Obama said.

The president has the power to void foreign transactions under the Defense Production Act. It authorizes the president to suspend or prohibit certain acquisitions of U.S. businesses if there is credible evidence that the foreign purchaser might take action that threatens to impair national security.

CFIUS is chaired by the treasury secretary. The secretaries of state, defense, commerce, energy and homeland security are also on the committee. The director of national intelligence is a non-voting member.

Earlier this month, Ralls sued the national security panel, alleging CFIUS exceeded its authority when it ordered the company to cease operations and withdraw from the wind-farm developments it bought. Ralls asked for a restraining order and a preliminary injunction to allow construction at the wind farms to continue. The firm said it would lose the chance for a $25 million investment tax if the farms were not operable by Dec. 31.

But Ralls dropped the lawsuit this week after CFIUS allowed the firm to resume some pre-construction work.

Ralls’ legal team includes Paul Clement and Viet Dinh, two top law veterans of President George W. Bush’s administration. Both men were key players in Bush’s aggressive national security operation.

Clement, who was solicitor-general and argued administration positions before the Supreme Court, has since opposed the Obama administration’s health care plan and defended the Defense of Marriage Act before the top court.

Dinh, a former assistant attorney general who was the main architect of the Bush administration’s anti-terror USA Patriot Act, has lately served as a director and legal adviser to Rupert Murdoch’s News Corporation.

A second Chinese firm stymied by CFIUS urged U.S. authorizes this week to investigate their firm to quell fears of ties to China’s military. Huawei Technologies Ltd. announced in early September that it would unwind its purchase of U.S.-based computer firm 3Leaf Systems after the deal was rejected by CFIUS.

Huawei, one of the world’s largest producers of computer network switching gear, has repeatedly struggled to convince U.S. authorities that they can be trusted to oversee sensitive technology sometimes used in national security work.

Not Without My American Car

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Hani Almadhoun09/28/2012
So now that I have passed my driving test and feel that I have practiced enough to consider buying a car, I have to wrestle with what kind of car to buy. My wife and I live in the city, so a small car seems the sensible way to go. 
Most of my friends have warned against American-made cars. “They suck,” said a former military officer friend of mine. “They will break the bank,” said my friend who is an accountant. “We do not know how to make cars anymore,” mentioned my friend Joey. My attorney friend recommended a Honda or a Subaru. Those are only a few examples of the negative comments I have heard about American cars. Few friends have had anything nice to say about them.

Hearing all of this was a buzz kill for me, because while the car size and color were important to my wife, having an American-made car was important to me. This is primarily due to three main factors.

First, American cars were quite popular while I was growing up in Dubai in the late ’80s. They were everywhere and almost everyone was talking about the ‘muscle’ cars that were coming in from America. (Ok, they love their Benz too.) So I grew up coveting American-made cars and goods.

Second, I have made frequent trips to Michigan, to the city of Dearborn particularly, and I know how prideful Arab-Americans are about their American made cars. Everyone in that town loves to talk about Ford and how it was the reason many immigrants ended up there working in the car industry and building American engines. Many Lebanese flocked to the area in the early 1900’s seeking jobs at Henry Ford’s Model T plant, as the pioneering automobile entrepreneur was offering a whopping $5 a day. That kind of pride left an imprint on me. I have had dinner at the home of an engineer who works for Ford and was part of the team that worked on the Sync technology. You cannot match this kind of pride, not even in Japan. Notable Arab Americans have played significant roles in the car industry, like Jacques Nasser, who was formerly the president and CEO of Ford Motor Company. Another Arab American is credited with creating “the ‘revolutionary’ 1949 Ford car design, a design that some credit with saving the company.” You have Richard Caleal to thank for that.

Third, I live in the States, a place that has given me a refuge — a home away from home. I went to school here and work here. I live here and I know that in these tough economic times, people need to stick together. We cannot always look for what’s best for ourselves, like better car mileage, and ignore the ghost towns around the county. This was the same mentality of an Arab American physician that limited himself to buying only American cars. The same sentiments were echoed by my good friend Sarah — a native of Michigan who got on my case until I finally bought our car. It might be loyalty, or some might call it patriotism, but either way it’s a choice people here are free to make.

My wife and I settled for a Chevy Aveo LS — a nice compact car that meets our needs. My wife Roa has even given it a name after her own mother. She loves the little car. We have learned that American-made cars tend to have cheaper parts and there is no shortage of mechanics who are well-versed in American cars. One doesn’t need to hop in a time machine to find good American-made cars.

I once worked for a former member of Congress, a native of Cleveland, and she told me that she will only drive American cars to show support to the hard working men and women working in local car plants.

But the cynics and skeptics are not all bad. In fact I think those who criticize the American car industry do it a huge a favor; they pressure automakers to innovate and make better cars. We cannot all take whatever the car industry makes — they have to be responsive to their customer base. This is what makes a free market and this certainly makes better cars. If all customers were content with mediocre cars, then no one wins.

The Return of 'Made in USA'

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ResourceMFG
September 25, 2012
As rhetoric about the need for more manufacturing jobs spreads across the country, and those who can create such jobs are hailed as heroes, a growing number of manufacturing firms are boasting their American beginnings to bring in new business, CNN reports.
According to the media outlet, buying something with a tag that says “Made in USA” has more meaning for consumers now that doing so is, in essence, helping to revive the struggling U.S. economy. Seeing a perfect opening, marketing-savvy businesses are now touting their American-made products.

Dave Schiff, chief creative officer at Made Movement, a website that markets and sells only American-made products, said the trend is beginning to spread, and that it could be a major influence on the success of American manufacturing companies.

Earning that iconic tag, however, is no easy feat. The Federal Trade Commission has drafted a 44-page book that discusses exactly what it takes to gain “Made in USA” status.

The timing may be just right for us manufacturers to boast their American factories, considering Robert McCutcheon, the U.S. industrial products leader of PwC, recently wrote in Forbes that there are a number of signs that domestic manufacturing could soon surge again. 

SOURCE:  ResourceMFG

'Made in The USA' Can Save Manufacturing Costs

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Strategic Sourceror 
September 28, 2012
As it becomes increasingly expensive to outsource business to other countries, American companies are embracing the “Made in the USA” trend. Investing at home instead of on foreign shores can boost a company’s productivity, and cut costs for businesses concerned about rising production prices.
Inventory management
With clients shopping online and in stores, it’s important to manage inventory wisely and be able to quickly increase or pull the plug on certain products. When a product isn’t selling well, a management team doesn’t want to be stuck with a massive amount of inventory that has yet to be shipped from across the globe. When production facilities are located in the U.S., it’s easier for businesses to move through the product quickly and make room for goods that will sell well.

While a product can arrive in days, or even hours, from across the country, it can take weeks for products to be shipped from overseas. Asking clients to wait a day before receiving their item is easier than asking them to wait three weeks while it is shipped from Asia. Managing inventory and stock is much easier when a company doesn’t have to worry about shipping time, complicated logistics and miscommunications that can lead to serious delays.

Trend forecasting
When your products are made at home, it’s easy to take advantage of local trends. When certain goods become more popular, it’s easy to have them made quickly and ready to sell in no time. Consumer demand may rise sharply if a product becomes particularly popular, and it’s much easier to manage production levels when a company’s manufacturing is close by. It’s easy to predict a trend when a business owner is local, and an L.A. company may be able to determine what they need before their supplier in China does.

Cutting costs
Moving production back to the U.S. doesn’t just help with inventory management and make it easier to change orders quickly. It’s also saving companies money on their production.

Many countries in Asia used to be known for their cheap labor and inexpensive supplies, which made it common for business to move their manufacturing facilities there. In the past few years, the cost of doing business in these traditionally inexpensive countries has been rising. This has made the U.S. a more attractive place to do business, and companies are noting the decreased costs and slowly moving their production back to the U.S.

Cities Leading An American Manufacturing Revival

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Joel Kotkin

5/24/2012 
In this still tepid recovery, the biggest feel-good story has been the resurgence of American manufacturing. As industrial production has fallen in Europe and growth has slowed in China, U.S. factories have continued an expansion that has stretched on for over 33 months. In April, manufacturing growth was the strongest in 10 months. 
There are a number of reasons for this revival. Rising wages in China – up from roughly one-third U.S. levels to half that in a decade — and problems associated with protection of trademarks and other issues have led many U.S. executives to look back home. Some 22% of U.S. product manufacturers surveyed by MFGWatch reported moving some production back to America in the fourth quarter of 2011, and one in three said they were studying the proposition. 

Certainly how long this expansion can last is an open question, particularly given weakness in Europe and the slowdown in formerly fast-growing developing countries. But one thing is clear: the industrial resurgence is reshaping the economic and employment map in often unexpected ways.

Now rather than being pulled down by manufacturing, our Best Cities For Jobs survey, conducted by Pepperdine University’s Michael Shires, found that many industrial regions are benefiting from their prowess.

From 2010 through March, manufacturers added 470,000 jobs and enjoyed a rate of job growth 10% faster than the rest of the private economy. In the past many areas suffered from having too many industrial workers. Now it looks like we will have too few skilled ones, even in hard-hit sectors like the auto industry. In 2011 there were 50,000 unfilled U.S. job openings in industrial engineering, welding, and computer-controlled machine tool operating, according to the forecasting firm EMSI. If the revival continues, this shortage could worsen.

To determine the cities that are leading the manufacturing revival, we assessed manufacturing employment growth in the 65 largest metropolitan statistical areas. Rankings are based on recent growth trends, as well as job growth over the past five and 10 years, and the MSAs’ momentum.

Where Technology Meets Manufacturing

In an era of excitement over the Internet, it is often forgotten that a majority of the country’s scientists and engineers work for manufacturers, and that industrial companies account for 68% of business R&D spending, which in turn accounts for about 70% of total R&D spending.

Nowhere is this linkage between technology and industry more evident than in the Seattle-Bellevue-Everett area, which ranks first on our list of the metropolitan areas leading the manufacturing revival. Over the past year the region was No. 2 in the nation in manufacturing growth, with employment expanding 7.9%. The aerospace sector, led by Boeing, accounted for roughly half this expansion.

The growth in aerospace and high-tech employment creates precisely the kinds of high-wage jobs, including for blue-collar workers, that are lacking in many parts of the country. In 2010 the average factory wage in the area was $64,925, up 9% from 2007. Most critically, manufacturing activity drives growth in other sectors of the economy. About one in six of all private-sector jobs depend on the manufacturing sector, and every dollar of sales of manufactured products generates $1.40 in output from other sectors, the highest of any industry.

As manufacturing employment overall has dropped, the percentage of higher-wage, skilled industrial jobs has been climbing over the last decades, particularly in high-technology related fields Overall, according to EMSI data, the average American factory worker earned $73,000 in 2011, $20,000 more than the average job.

Seattle is not alone in creating high-tech-oriented industrial jobs. Over the past two years Salt Lake City, Utah, which ranks third on our list, has seen significant growth in both electronics and aerospace employment, including a new Northrop Grumman facility. Firms connected to the medical device industry such as Biomerics are also expanding in the area.

Manufacturing is also rebounding in Austin-Round Rock-San Marcos, Texas, which ranks eighth on our list and No. 1 on our overall list of Best Big Cities For Jobs. Last year industrial employment in the Texas state capital area jumped 5%. Semiconductor firms are a big force, employing over 10,000 workers. Although more known for its high-tech electronics, Austin has also enjoyed an expansion in automobile-related employment as well as medical devices.

Energy Capitals

The largest grouping of manufacturing stars have emerged from the Texas-Oklahoma energy belt. With the shale drilling boom unlocking ample supplies of natural gas and lowering prices, petrochemical companies have undertaken major expansions. The rise in drilling and exploration has also sparked greater demand for industrial products such as pipes, drill rigs and other machinery. No surprise that the biggest backers of shale gas exploration are prominent CEOs of industrial firms. A recent study by PwC suggests that shale gas could lead to the development of 1 million industrial jobs.

The shale drilling revolution is making an impact across the country, in places like North Dakota and Youngstown, Ohio, but the epicenter of this boom remains firmly in the oil patch. The Thunder you hear in Oklahoma City is not just on the basketball court — energy growth has propelled a 1,500 person jump in manufacturing employment, a 6.1% increase, with another 1,000 new jobs expected this year. Oklahoma City ranks second on our list.

Other energy capitals are also thriving on the industrial front, including Houston (fourth place), San Antonio (seventh) and Ft. Worth-Arlington (ninth). Although energy is the main driver, manufacturing has been on the rise in a broad array of areas, including aerospace, biomedical and food processing. The surging export economy — Texas is easily the nation’s number one export
er —
has further bolstered this growth.

Rustbelt Rebounders

The high-tech and energy economies may be fast-breaking in terms of industrial growth, but manufacturing’s comeback has put some new bounce in the step of many long forlorn parts of the nation’s “rustbelt.” Warren-Troy-Farmington Hills, Mich., epitomizes this trend. Unlike Detroit, which has suffered mass disinvestment, this more suburban area a half hour drive away has become the epicenter of a new, more tech-oriented auto industry.

The Warren-Troy area’s rich concentration of skilled tradespeople and industrial engineers has been described as America’s “automation alley.” It continues to attract high-industrial firms from abroad such as Brose, a German car parts manufacturer, which has recently announced a $60 million investment in the area. Even housing is on the rebound, with rents rising at the fourth highest clip in the country, just behind such standouts as San Francisco and Miami.

Nor is the Midwest manufacturing rebound limited to Michigan. Over the past year sixth-ranked Cincinnati enjoyed 5.4% growth in industrial employment. Manufacturing growth was also strong in Milwaukee-Waukesha-West Allis, Wisc., a center for the production of machine tools and other precision equipment that ranks 10th on our list.

Who’s Falling Behind

 Of course not all regions have benefited from the industrial resurgence. For example, the nation’s largest industrial area, Los Angeles, ranks a miserable 49th. The area lost some 20% of its industrial jobs since 2006, and the losses continued over the past year. This goes a long way to explain the area’s continued underperformance before, during and, now, in the early days of recovery from the financial crisis.

Some other large regions did even worse, including such one-time industrial powerhouses as Philadelphia (55th) and New York (59th). Some may argue that these, and other areas, which have been losing manufacturing jobs for decades, no longer need to engage in the messy business of making stuff. But that long fashionable way thinking may be outdated itself, as seen by the improving fortunes of our industrial top 10.

Full List: The 10 Cities Leading The U.S. Manufacturing Revival

SOURCE: Forbes

Hershey Invests $300 Million In Future Of American Manufacturing… And Consumption

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Inside the new plant. Courtesy of Hershey.

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Caleb Melby
9/25/2012 
In an election season wrought with intense debate about the economy, including the role of  manufacturing within that economy (and within that, too, a healthy debate about the government’s role in maintaining that manufacturing presence), there is at least one company that is doubling down on making stuff in the US — candy-maker Hershey. 
Last week, the company unveiled a new plant in its hometown (also Hershey) — spending $200 million in infrastructure and another $100 million in additional costs to construct the plant.

I talked with JP Bilbrey, President and CEO and Terry O’Day, SVP of Global Operations about the investment. Both say that the plant is an homage the company’s roots and founder, which is a warm, nice thought.  More tangibly, what it does is reaffirm Pennsylvania’s role in the company’s chocolate manufacturing for North America. The plant employs technology never before seen in candy manufacturing, O’Day says,  including highly automated IT systems designed to keep Hershey’s Kisses rolling off the lines 24 hours a day.

And while automation means fewer workers in the plant,(Hershey is training 700 of its 4,800 Pennsylvanian employees to run it) the company estimates that it will still produce $1 billion in economic gains for Pennsylvania over the course of five years — coming in the form of supplier contracts, payroll and related spending.

It may be cheaper to manufacture in other countries — and Hershey does, its playing a big game in emerging markets like India, China and Brazil — but when it comes to making chocolate there are other things to consider. For Hershey, that means access to fresh milk. Their West Hershey plant consumes between 300,000 and 350,000 gallons of milk a day — mostly from a 90-mile radius surrounding the plants. And they want short commutes for products to retailers.

The new plant isn’t the only way Hershey is employing technology. Come candy seasons (Valentine’s Day, Halloween, Christmas) they now use a proprietary system to place orders for retailers — so they know how much of each Hershey’s product they should purchase. This alone would be unremarkable, but retailers have come to trust the system so thoroughly that Hershey now uses the system to order competitors’ products for retailers too. The combination of trust and efficiency has reaped the company serious rewards — their market cap that has doubled in the past five years, growing 20% in the past 12 months.

Bilbrey affirms that 80-90% of Hershey products consumed in the US are made in the US, and the company boasts more than a 40% share of the American chocolate market. In that sense, the new plant is part of Hershey’s broader strategy — to maintain, if not grow, share in the US, where it already has a prominent presence, while more or less ignoring another behemoth established market — Western Europe, where they see low growth, established competitors, loyal customers and high price of entry.

“We have outperformed our peer group in North America,” Bilbrey says.  “And we see North America as a growth story. We worry about a lot of things, but we are optimistic about what is possible.”

That includes upping advertising, Bilbrey says that Hershey spends as much on advertising now as their entire category did in 2008 — Hershey now reinvests about 7% of net sales into advertising. More proof, he says, that the company believes that brighter days lie ahead for America and that Americans will be spending more of their disposable income on candy.

SOURCE: Forbes

Manufacturing Renaissance? Exports, Reshoring Could Bring 5M Jobs to U.S.

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Photo Credit: Reuters

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By Jennifer Booton
September 21, 2012

An expected surge in exports could help create up to five million U.S. jobs by 2020, according to a report released Friday by the Boston Consulting Group.
U.S.-born exports are expected to surge, with domestic manufacturers standing to capture 2% to 7% of Western European and Japanese exports due to lower labor and energy costs, which would translate to as much as $90 billion in additional U.S. exports, BCG research finds.

The uptick is production combined with the jobs needed for reshoring could add up to 2.5 million to 5 million jobs by the end of the decade as manufacturers shift production back to the U.S., according to the study.

That’s up from BCG’s forecast last year, when it predicted the U.S. would add just 2 to 3 million jobs, as major companies have started revealing intentions to shift some jobs to the U.S. over the next few quarters.

“Over the coming years, as European and Japanese companies decide where to locate new capacity, we can expect many more announcements like these,” said Michael Zinser, coauthor of the BCG report who leads the firm’s manufacturing work in the Americas.

While the return of jobs to U.S. shores, also referred to as insourcing and onshoring, is still a relatively new phenomenon, several large manufacturers have recently announced plans to expand or move production to the country.

Toyota, for example, announced that it will export Camry sedans made in Kentucky and Sienna minivans made in Indiana to South Korea, while its Japanese auto rivals Honda and Nissan plan to increase production in the U.S. While U.S. automakers continue to expand to the high-growth markets in Asia, General Motors has vowed to invest $2 billion in U.S. factories by 2014.

Siemens is building gas turbines in North Carolina to ship to Saudi Arabia for construction of a 4-gigawatt power plant, while Rolls-Royce recently opened a new aircraft engine parts manufacturing facility in Virginia, citing among other things lower labor costs.

The reshoring moves come as average manufacturing costs continue to fall in the U.S. BCG estimates that they will be 8% lower than in the U.K. in 2015, 15% lower than in both Germany and France, 21% lower than in Japan and 22% lower than in Italy.

China will still be about 7% cheaper than the U.S. but that doesn’t include the high cost to ship bulk items around the world.

A decline in labor costs are expected to help give the U.S. a competitive advantage in manufacturing compared with some of its developed peers, where they will be paying workers anywhere from 20% to 45% more, BCG estimates.

Lower energy and gas costs, led by the recovery of deposits in the oil-rich Bakken and Marcellus Shales, are also expected to help.

“The signs pointing to continued export growth offer further evidence that the U.S. is poised for a manufacturing renaissance between 2015 and 2020,” said Harold Sirkin, a senior partner at BCG who coauthored the research.

In Manufacturing Shift, Made in U.S. but Sold in China

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Viktor Sitnikov assembled a faucet at the Watermark Design factory in East New York on Thursday. | Photo Credit: Kirsten Luce for The NYT

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By JIM DWYER
September 20, 2012
Standing over a small tank of water in a Brooklyn factory, Zbigniew Solecki plunged a gleaming faucet into the water, then shot air at 60 pounds per square inch into it. He watched for rising bubbles, a sign that an unseen fissure had, unacceptably, let the air stream out. It is a rite of passage that Mr. Solecki performs dozens of times a day. 
“Every last piece is pressure-tested before it goes out the door to China,” said Jack Abel, the engineer who built the factory. “Or anywhere else.”

Yes, he did say China.

Mr. Abel’s company, Watermark Designs in Brooklyn, is standing history on its head: it is making plumbing parts and shipping them to China.

After generations of manufacturers in New York and across the United States folded because they were unable to compete with imports, Watermark, with its only factory in the East New York section of Brooklyn, has managed to crack the code. Instead of trying to make Watermark’s products cheaper, Mr. Abel has prospered by first making them more expensive — offering custom-made fixtures unique to each building — and then figuring out how to do that at lower cost. The company has supplied thousands of fixtures to six new luxury hotels and condominiums being built in Shanghai, Macau and Hong Kong.

“The days of mass producing in New York City are gone,” Mr. Abel said. “If you were producing nuts and bolts by the tens of thousands 50 years ago, you’re not going to do it today. But creativity, or uniqueness or design is definitely something that can flourish in New York.”

Just as they have in many parts of the country, exports have taken up the slack for the business that Watermark lost during the economic downturn that began in 2008. The New York metropolitan area led the nation last year in exports, rising to $105 billion, its highest ever, from $85 billion in 2010, according to a report released last week by the International Trade Administration, a branch of the United States Department of Commerce that supports companies doing business overseas.

Fencing and flooring for dance clubs, stadiums, and big tents are being made in the Bronx by Signature Fencing and Flooring and shipped to South Africa, Japan, Britain and India. From Medford, on Long Island, Enecon, which makes corrosion-resistant coatings for industrial equipment, ships to 65 countries.

Manufacturing jobs in New York have declined by about 80 percent from a high of 1.1 million jobs in 1947, all but shutting down what had been a heavily trod avenue into the middle class for immigrants and people without advanced educations.

Mr. Abel, who was born in Israel, grew up in the Bronx and studied engineering at the City College of New York and Columbia University, started his business in 1976 in a small metal plating company that his father ran from a 2,000-square-foot storefront in Sunset Park, Brooklyn. For a number of years, it did well and grew by refinishing inexpensive parts and selling them through neighborhood bath stores and the early home improvement centers. Mr. Abel moved into supplying high-end fixtures just as the city was entering a period of luxury construction.

It was a strong strategy, made possible, Mr. Abel said, by his son Avi, who joined the business after graduating from the State University of New York at Binghamton (now Binghamton University) and among other things, overhauled its design capabilities. Around 2006, Watermark bought a three-dimensional printer for $60,000. It works like an ink jet printer, except that it squirts molten plastic to build a form, instead of ink onto paper.

Robert Brenner, 26, a design engineer for the company, showed a plastic prototype of a handle made to an architect’s specifications. “This took three to four hours,” he said.

After the prototype is approved, Watermark tunes its lathes and milling machines to make the actual parts. In such a world, cheap labor is a dwindling advantage. “I can get the best equipment,” Mr. Abel said. “I can’t get someone to operate it — machinists, machine programmers, people with knowledge how to operate sophisticated equipment, they’re not there.”

Nearly 40 years after starting in the storefront, the company employs 45 people in 55,000 square feet. Most of the workers have been with the company for 10 years or more. Besides high-tech equipment, the company now has something else that wasn’t available years ago — Brooklyn chic.

“My son says we should stand on a box and shout it loud: ‘This is made not only in the U.S.A., but in Brooklyn,’ ” Mr. Abel said, “It’s what Paris had been. We have become a design mecca.”

Contact JIM DWYER 
E-mail: dwyer@nytimes.com
Twitter: @jimdwyernyt

Living Paycheck To Paycheck: Two-Thirds Of Americans Are Struggling To Get By

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Reuters  |  By Jim Forsyth 
Posted: 09/20/2012
SAN ANTONIO, Sept 19 (Reuters) – More than two-thirds of Americans are now living paycheck to paycheck, according to a survey released on Wednesday by the American Payroll Association. The survey of 30,600 people found that 68 percent said it would be somewhat difficult or very difficult if their paychecks were delayed for a week. These results show Americans are still struggling with the recession’s effects, the association said. 
“This study clearly shows that Americans are finding it hard to save,” said Dan Maddux, executive director of the San Antonio-based association of payroll managers.

In 2006, 65 percent of respondents reported living paycheck to paycheck, a figure that shot up to 72 percent in 2010 in the wake of the recession.

The survey was released during a week when a video of Republican Mitt Romney sparked a national conversation about the 47 percent of Americans who, Romney told donors, don’t pay income taxes and are dependent on government.

Tracy Martinez knows the feeling of living paycheck to paycheck.

The San Antonio woman has a college degree. She and her husband both work, but Martinez still holds her breath that she won’t have any emergencies come up, especially in the days right before payday.

“It seems like all the money goes away so quickly,” she said. “It’s kind of scary.”

Wendy Kowalik, president of the San Antonio financial planning firm Predico Partners, called the study “disturbing, but not surprising.”

Saving money is becoming more difficult, if not impossible, for more U.S. workers, Kowalik said.

“All of us in the industry are seeing it more often, that more and more clients are unable to save for the future,” she said.

The main reason Kowalik’s clients live paycheck to paycheck is that they have come to see luxuries as essential expenses, she said.

“Cable used to be a luxury. Now it’s expected,” she said. “People have an expectation that they should have a mobile phone, you should be able to have the Internet. People are going to have to change their outlook and put things into perspective.”

The American Payroll Association, a trade group for more than 20,000 people who prepare checks, said it conducted the online survey between May and Sept. 7. It had a margin of error of plus or minus 1 percent.

The Made In America Movement Teams Up With All American Clothing Co.

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Dayton, OH (PRWEB) 
September 20, 2012 
The Made In America Movement highlights American manufacturers to educate consumers on the importance of buying American made products. It`s latest partnership is with the All American Clothing Co.
The Made In America Movement is a nonpartisan organization that connects U.S. manufacturers with consumers in an effort to play their part in the restoration of the U.S. economy. The organization was started by Margarita Mendoza in 2010. At the time, she was trying to help someone else build their business. Struggling, not bringing in an income, and not being able to find a job after 3 years of searching, she was told by the person she was trying to help to go out and “brand yourself”. And so, The Made in America Movement was born. The organization shares ideas to consumers on how to get involved in supporting American Made products within their communities and across the United States. By educating consumers on the importance of buying American made products, the organization can ultimately help create jobs for now and future generations. 

The Made In America Movement also supports American manufacturers by enlisting hundreds of them on their website. All companies who are listed are invitation only and must pass a series of reviews and inspections to prove they are USA Made. Companies who are part of the Made in America Movement stretch from Our USA Magazine to Dave Matthews and his Dreaming Tree Wines. All share a USA Made passion as each take pride in providing items that make a difference in the creation of U.S. jobs. 
“By educating consumers on the importance of buying American made products, the organization can ultimately help create jobs for now and future generations.”
The Made In America Movement`s latest partnership is with the All American Clothing Co. The USA Made clothing company was established in 2002 by Lawson Nickol who had been a sales manager for another ‘USA Made’ clothing manufacturer. After finding out that his manufacturer had begun outsourcing its product to Mexico, he quickly turned in his resignation and started the All American Clothing Co. with his wife Mary Ann, and his son BJ. Their USA Made clothing company was founded with a mission to support USA families and jobs by producing high-quality clothing in the USA at an affordable price. Today, All American Clothing Co. produces thousands of USA made jeans and clothing a year to citizens across all regions of the United States. 
The Made In America Movement welcomes the All American Clothing Co. to an impressive inventory of USA Made manufacturers that include the likes of Florida`s Natural Orange Juice and HF Coors Dinnerware.The Made In America Movement also features a special section dedicated to an upcoming documentary film entitled “Made in the USA: The 30 Day Journey.” In the film, Josh Miller attempts to live off of USA Made items only for 30 straight days while interviewing politicians, scholars, and manufacturers to find out if the phase “Made in USA” means anything anymore. 
About The Made In America Movement: 
The Made In America Movement and its members care for the people in the United States. All members of the organization carry a passion for doing their part to create jobs in today`s economy. For more information on The Made In America Movement and its members, please visit http://www.themadeinamericamovement.com.

About All American Clothing Co: 
All American Clothing Co. offers you high quality USA Made jeans and clothing at an affordable price. The company offers a unique ‘Traceability’ program in which each jean comes with a ‘traceability’ number. Enter the number at http://www.allamericanclothing.com and they will tell you exactly which American farmers and mill were involved in producing your jean. 

CONTACT:
Logan Beam 
All American Clothing Co. 
888-937-8009
Email  

Margarita Mendoza 
The Made in America Movement 
914-776-8660
Email  

A Label That Has Regained Its Luster

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From left, John Kieselhorst, Dave Schiff and Scott Prindle, founders of Made. | Photo Credit: Benjamin Rasmussen for The New York Times

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By ALEX WILLIAMS
September 14, 2012
REMEMBER the Chrysler K-car? Dave Schiff, a founder of Made Collection, a new flash-sale site that sells only American-made goods, hopes not. 
When he was coming of age in the early ’80s, the phrase “Buy American” was epitomized by Chrysler’s boxy, style-challenged sedan, marketed as a star-spangled rebuke to the sleek imports of the day. In Mr. Schiff’s view, you bought one to satisfy a patriotic duty, not a sense of style. “ ‘Made in the U.S.A.’ came with baggage,” he said.

Times have changed. Even as the “Made in the U.S.A.” label has grown scarce, thanks to the offshore manufacturing in apparel and other industries, it has acquired cachet as a signifier of old-school craftsmanship, even luxury.

The movement has come far enough that Mr. Schiff, a former advertising executive from Miami, believed the time was right to start a Gilt-like shopping site for the Americana set, selling items like shuttle-loom jeans, lace baby dolls and a 19th-century-style baseball made of leather sourced from a Chicago tannery.

“The old ‘Buy American’ is get something lousy and pay more,” said Mr. Schiff, 45. Now “it’s a premium product.”

Style bloggers were among the early adopters. “ ‘Made in U.S.A.’ has gone through a rebranding of sorts,” said Michael Williams, whose popular men’s style blog, A Continuous Lean, has become an online clubhouse for devotees of American-made heritage labels like Red Wing Shoes and Filson.

But the embrace of domestic goods has also moved beyond scruffy D.J. types in Brooklyn who plunk down $275 for a pair of hand-sewn dungarees sewn from Cone denim from the company’s White Oak plant in North Carolina. The adherents now include “urban creatives, high-net-worth individuals, locavores, liberals, conservatives,” said Mr. Williams, who also represents some of these heritage brands as a marketing consultant.

In other words, Americana chic has gone mainstream. Just visit the nearest mall. Club Monaco unveiled a Made in the USA collection last year, in collaboration with Mr. Williams. J. Crew cashes in on Americana chic by selling domestically manufactured Alden shoes, Levi’s Vintage Clothing jeans and Billykirk leather goods. Joseph Abboud’s home page trumpets its collections as “Made in the New America.”

The newfound pride also extends to American cities and smaller communities. Made in Brooklyn is a phenomenon so self-aware, there are stores like By Brooklyn that specialize in products made in the borough. Similarly, an old shoe-polish brand called Shinola has recently been revived to make upscale watches, bicycles and other crafted goods in Detroit and is being promoted as “Made in Detroit.”

And in a survey last year of 1,300 affluent shoppers by Unity Marketing, a Pennsylvania-based consulting and marketing group, respondents ranked the United States first (higher than Italy or France) in perceived manufacturing quality of luxury goods.

Indeed, the “Made in the U.S.A.” label has become chic in the eyes of well-heeled consumers not just in the United States, but also in Asia, said Paulette Garafalo, the president for international, wholesale and manufacturing at Brooks Brothers, which has increased production of shirts, suits and neckwear at its three American factories to meet growing demand. “People want the credibility of an American brand,” she said.

The flight of American factory jobs has even become a heated issue in the presidential race, with President Obama and Mitt Romney trading jabs over being the “Outsourcer in Chief,” to use Mr. Romney’s phrase.

But while American-made goods are now fashionable, few have been willing to stake their professional future on it quite like Mr. Schiff. A former advertising executive at Crispin Porter + Bogusky in Miami, who oversaw the introduction of Coke Zero, he left the firm in April to start Made with two other veterans from the agency, Scott Prindle and John Kieselhorst.

In a sense, they started two companies, which are based in Boulder, Colo.: Made Collection, the flash-sale site, and Made Movement, an advertising agency that represents companies that manufacture only in America. (“If Apple came to us, we’d have to turn them down,” Mr. Schiff said.)

Unlike the typical Buy American sites, which feature crude graphics and a low-budget hodgepodge of pliers and rain boots, Made Collection has the slick yet earthy look of a Madewell campaign. Edie Ure, a former designer for Ralph Lauren and Anthropologie, serves as the site’s curator, and she gives special consideration to design-forward wares that would not be out of place in a Monocle magazine gift guide.

Recent flash-sale items included a knot-back black swimsuit from Cala Ossidiana, a swimwear company based in New York. It sells for $295 and, according to a graphic accompanying each item, supports six American workers. For those with humbler tastes, there was an O.C.E. Hickory work shirt, produced by inmates in the Oregon correctional system as part of its job-training program, for $26.99.

The company grew out of Mr. Schiff’s conviction that a manufacturing revival was crucial to a lasting economic recovery.

Made now counts 26 employees, and with a minimum of publicity, its site has 10,000 members. The ad agency has signed seven clients, including Emeco chairs, a Pennsylvania-based design company whose product sells at Design Within Reach, and New Belgium Brewing, based in Fort Collins, Colo., which brews Fat Tire ale.

Mr. Schiff practices what he preaches. For a recent lunch at the Ace Hotel in Manhattan, he wore Levi’s premium shuttle-loom 501s made in Los Angeles. His tattooed arms poked out of a blue checked shirt by the boutique design house 8.15 August Fifteenth, made in New York City, which he spruced up with a seersucker bow tie by Gitman Bros., made in North Carolina. The only smudge on the stars-and-stripes tableau was his pair of Vans sneakers made in China.

“I would say most days, I’m at about 75 percent,” he said, referring to how much of his outfit is American made. He never wants to become a fanatic, however. “If you become obsessive about it,” he added, “it’s an imposition versus a choice.”

Source: New York Times

A version of this article appeared in print on September 16, 2012, on page ST16 of t
he Ne
w York edition with the headline: A Label That Has Regained Its Luster. 

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Outsourcing May Cause High Unemployment and Manufacturing Decline

Outsourcing May Cause High Unemployment and Manufacturing Decline

All American Clothing Co., proud corporate members of The Made in America Movement, announces a new warning label that raises awareness of the consequences of outsourcing and buying foreign-made items in the United States. Read more

Advanced Solar CPV Manufacturing Plant to Open in NC this Month

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SEPTEMBER 17, 2012 
BY ANDREW BURGER 
Semprius is readying the opening of its first manufacturing facility later this month in Henderson, North Carolina. With backing and support from the Obama Administration, the DOE, and the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) in Golden, Colorado, Semprius has developed the world’s most efficient solar PV cells. Its concentrating photovoltaic (CPV) technology is capable of converting 33.9% of the energy in sunlight to usable electricity, according to the parties involved.
Management initially expects to produce five to six megawatts (MW) worth of its leading-edge CPV modules per year at the Henderson, NC plant. That could over time expand to as much as 35 MW and employ as many as 250 people in doing so, according to a Bloomberg News report.

Swimming Against the TideSemprius is opening its CPV plant amidst a general backdrop of solar energy market and industry turmoil, manufacturing plant slowdowns, shutdowns, and layoffs — both in the US and other other major solar-producing countries, including Germany and China. Management and its investors believe that the combination of high-efficiency and low-cost production will prove the company viable in a fiercely competitive global solar PV market that governments around the world have targeted as a low-carbon, green economy growth engine.

“Semprius’ modules are the most efficient in the world and ‘very price competitive’ with rivals such as First Solar Inc. (FSLR) and SunPower Corp. (SPWR), among others,” Bloomberg quoted Semprius CEO Joe Carr as saying. “In very high brightness areas where we do our best work, we’re highly competitive.” Carr declined to discuss cost details.
Pratt & Whitney Rocketdyne and Siemens AG — both of whom have taken equity stakes in the emerging solar CPV manufacturer — are two of its initial customers. Semprius has raised $40 million from investors over the past 15 months, Bloomberg reports. Pratt & Whitney Rocketdyne and Siemens together own 16% of the company.

A SunShot CPV Manufacturer Ready to Go Commercial
Semprius received initial seed funding from the DOE under President Obama’s “SunShot Incubator” program, refining and proving its technology with NREL in Golden. NREL validated Semprius’ tiny, dot-sized CPV cells as having an energy conversion efficiency of 41% at a concentration of 1,000 suns.

In its search for a location to build a manufacturing plant to commercialize its CPV cells and modules, Semprius landed in Henderson, NC. Construction of its 50,000-square-foot plant began earlier this year, with the state government and local agencies contributing $7.9 million towards construction.
About the diameter of a dot made by a ballpoint pen, Semprius’s solar photovoltaic (PV) cells are triple-junction cells made of gallium arsenide. Low-cost lenses concentrate sunlight 1,100 times onto the cells. Their tiny size reduces module cost, as they take up only 1/1000th of the entire solar module area. It also enables a high density of cells per module, which better distributes unwanted heat across the entire solar module solar area. That eliminates the need for heat dissipation hardware, such as heat fins, further reducing production costs.

Semprius’ patented micro-transfer printing process allows thousands of its concentrated solar PV cells (CPV) to be transferred from a growth substrate to a semiconductor wafer or other form factor. It’s a continuous, massive parallel process that runs continuously and allows the growth substrate to be used repeatedly, which cuts costs dramatically, according to NREL and Semprius.

U.S. to File W.T.O. Case Against China Over Cars

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Workers assemble cars at Beijing Automotive Group factory in Zhuzhou China. | Photo Creidt: Wangwei-CHINATOPIX via Associated Press

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By KEITH BRADSHER
September 16, 2012
The Obama administration plans to file a broad trade case at the World Trade Organization in Geneva on Monday accusing China of unfairly subsidizing its exports of autos and auto parts, a senior administration official said late Sunday, in a move with clear political implications for the presidential elections less than two months away. 
The W.T.O. case accuses China of providing at least $1 billion worth of subsidies from 2009 to 2011 for exports of autos and auto parts. While China exports virtually no fully assembled cars to the United States, it has rapidly expanded exports to developing countries, and those exports compete to some extent with cars exported or designed in the United States.

President Obama plans to announce the move on Monday during a visit to Ohio, one of the most important of the battleground states and a place where the president is trying to capitalize on his bailout of the auto industry. A poll by NBC News, The Wall Street Journal and Marist College last week showed Mr. Obama building a significant lead in Ohio.

The upper Midwestern states have emerged as a key battleground in the presidential election, particularly Ohio, which has rivaled Florida in recent presidential elections as the most hard-fought state of all. Ohio is also the hub of the American auto parts industry, which has suffered heavily from job losses that have coincided with surging imports of auto parts from China.

Auto parts employment in the United States has dropped by about one-half from 2001 to 2010, as imports from China grew nearly sevenfold over the same period, according to data provided by the senior official, who insisted on anonymity citing an administration policy banning on-the-record comments on a new policy before an official announcement is made. Auto parts manufacturers directly employ 54,200 people in Ohio, and when suppliers like steel makers are included, the auto industry accounts for 850,000 jobs in the state, or 12.4 percent of total employment there.

But auto industry experts debate the extent to which those imports have been directly responsible for the closing of factories and for cutbacks at other plants, as ever-increasing automation has also played some role. The slowing of the American auto market since 2008 has had an effect as well, although auto sales have begun to recover in recent months.

Mitt Romney, the Republican presidential nominee, has repeatedly accused the Obama administration of not doing enough to challenge China on trade and currency policies. But the timing of the administration case, coming so soon before the elections, makes it likely that the Chinese government will accuse President Obama of playing politics — an accusation already made by Chinese officials, particularly those with close ties to affected industries, in connection with recent trade cases involving solar panels.

Asked whether the trade cases against China were timed for political impact, the senior administration official replied by e-mail that “President Obama has prioritized enforcement of Americans’ rights in the global trading system from day one, and this administration has a consistent record of action to support American jobs.”

The press office at China’s commerce ministry had no comment when told by telephone on Monday morning of the planned trade case, asking for a fax of questions, which did not yield an immediate reply. Chinese officials have denied in general that they subsidize exports.

Chinese exports have surged particularly in the past year, as the Chinese economy has slowed sharply, leaving particularly the domestic Chinese automakers with huge inventories of unsold cars that they are seeking to sell overseas.

Speakers repeatedly mentioned during the Democratic convention the federal government bailout for the Detroit auto industry three years ago, following a perception that the bailout will prove politically advantageous in key states. By contrast, speakers during the Republican convention generally avoided the subject.

The administration also plans to take further legal steps on Monday in a W.T.O. case already pending against China over its imposition of steep anti-dumping duties last winter against more than 80 percent of American car exports to China. That case, described by people in China as largely the result of factional rivalries in Beijing that produced a need to take a strong stand against the United States, has begun to shift the focus of trade tensions between the United States and China toward the automotive sector.

The administration has been mulling a possible W.T.O case against China in the auto sector since at least last winter, and has been encouraged by unions to do so, particularly the United Steel Workers.​

Source: New York TimesA version of this article appeared in print on September 17, 2012, on page B3 of the New York edition with the headline: U.S. to File W.T.O. Case Against China Over Cars. 

Agribusinesses Owning Natural/Organic Brands Betray Customers: Fund Attack on GMO Labeling Proposal in California

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CORNUCOPIA, WI: Proposition 37, a citizen’s initiative on the ballot on November 6 in California, would mandate clear labeling of genetically engineered (GE) ingredients on food packages. It has become a battleground pitting consumer and farmer advocates against multi-billion-dollar agribusiness corporations.
Recent polling indicates almost 70% of citizens support informational labeling. And a flood of new contributions to fight the measure has rolled in from the biotechnology industry and food manufacturers, totaling over $23 million, according to the California Secretary of State. This dwarfs the approximately $3 million contributed by proponents of GE labeling.

“Consumers might be surprised to find out that brands hiding under ‘natural’ façades are in fact owned by multi-billion-dollar corporations that are contributing bushel baskets of cash to defeating Proposition 37,” says Charlotte Vallaeys, Director of Farm and Food Policy at The Cornucopia Institute.

Mandatory labeling of genetically engineered food in California is viewed as a watershed event by many industry observers, as many companies will find it logistically or economically difficult to produce foods with labels identifying GE for California while producing a different product line of foods for the rest of the country.

“Just as we’ve observed in Europe, where labeling of food containing genetically modified organisms (GMOs) is mandatory, we fully expect that when given a choice, consumers will choose organic or non-GMO products,” said Mark A. Kastel, Codirector of Wisconsin-based Cornucopia. “And the industrial food lobby is fully cognizant of this—that’s why they’re fighting like hell against this grassroots effort.”

To make it easier for shoppers to identify and support organic brands whose corporate owners support Proposition 37, and avoid buying brands owned by companies that financially contributed to opposing the “Right to Know” campaign, The Cornucopia Institute has developed a guide for consumers.

“If the food and biotech industries are so proud of their pervasive genetically manipulated crops, why are they so afraid, and so desperately opposed to labeling it?” asked Arran Stephens, founder of Nature’s Path, North America’s largest certified organic cereal and granola brand with manufacturing plants in the US and Canada.

Besides Nature’s Path, those who have contributed in support of Proposition 37 include venerable organic manufacturers such as Dr. Bronner’s, Nutiva and Lundberg rice.  These companies are all independently-owned businesses that avoid GMOs and are committed to supporting organic agriculture.

“Food companies are required by law to label ‘contains peanuts’ if included in their product.  People deserve the same for GMOs.  Our customers want to know if any product contains GMOs,” says John Roulac, founder and CEO of Nutiva, an organic food company.

On the other side, joining Monsanto and the giant food lobby group Grocery Manufacturers of America (GMA) in donating money to the effort to defeat the ballot initiative, are multi-billion-dollar, multi-national companies including General Mills, Dean Foods, Kellogg and Pepsico.  These companies own brands that are misrepresented to consumers as independent, value-driven businesses.

Biotechnology corporations and corporate agribusinesses have collectively donated millions of dollars to defeat Proposition 37.  Monsanto alone has donated $4.2 million, while food giants Pepsico and Coca Cola have each donated more than $1 million.

“Consumers are increasingly interested in ‘voting with their forks,’ and many want to support companies that share their values,” says Vallaeys.  “But consumers may not realize that many organic and ‘natural’ brands are owned by the very same corporations that are spending hundreds of thousands of dollars each, or even millions, in an effort to scuttle Proposition 37 in California,” she adds.

For example, Kashi is owned by Kellogg, which has contributed $612,000 to defeating Proposition 37.  Last year, The Cornucopia Institute published a study, Cereal Crimes, which revealed that the popular, “natural” Kashi GoLean cereal brand, unbeknownst to its customers, contains genetically engineered ingredients.

In what The Cornucopia Institute characterizes as “creating a façade,” nowhere on the Kashi website or packaging is it disclosed that the company is owned by Kellogg, rather than the “small band of passionate people” featured on the Kashi website.

Another example is Silk soymilk, which carries the “Non-GMO Project Verified” seal on its products but is owned by the nation’s largest dairy, Dean Foods, which has contributed $253,000 to the effort to kill Prop.  37.   Dean Foods also owns the Horizon Organic brand.  Both Silk and Horizon profess to consumers that the brands oppose GMOs.

“Talk is cheap,” adds Vallaeys.  “Consumers should not only know whether there are GMOs in their food, but also whether their hard-earned dollars are supporting companies that then turn around and invest those profits in the effort to sell-out their right to know.”

The Cornucopia Institute, which developed the funding guide, stresses that the organization is not against corporate involvement in organics.

“We welcome corporate involvement in the organic food industry, but only when the parent company subscribes to the values that the organic food movement is based on,” says Kastel.  “We have a problem with the duplicity of corporations that hide under a ‘holier-than-thou’ marketing brand and then undermine the very values of the organic movement.”

“For example, when Kellogg donates money to the Organic Trade Association, the Kashi brand appears on the OTA website.  But when the same company donates to the effort to defeat Proposition 37, Kellogg will do everything in its power to make sure that its Kashi customers, who seek wholesome and natural foods, do not associate the Kashi brand with a corporate contributor to the effort to kill Proposition 37,” adds Kastel.

The same is true for the R.W. Knudsen and Santa Cruz Organic brands, owned by Smucker, and the Cascadian Farm, Larabar and Muir Glen brands, owned by General Mills.  These corporate brand owners have donated $387,000 and $520,000, respectively, to defeating Proposition 37.

By using Cornucopia’s Proposition 37 funding guide, consumers can invest their food dollars in organic and non-GMO companies that are truly committed to supporting sustainable agriculture.

“Hiding the truth about our food is pervasive, unethical, and only done for money,” says Michael Potter, CEO of Eden Foods, an organic food manufacturer that financially contributed to support Proposition 37.  “Let this [Prop. 37] be the beginning of an end to it.”

In terms of businesses supporting Proposition 37, Dr. Joseph Mercola, of drmercola.com, has contributed $800,000.  The committee supporting Proposition 37 has also raised hundreds of thousands of dollars from individual citizens.  The Organic Consumers Association (OCA) has been a key funding and organizing driver of the GMO labeling effort.

Many of the seemingly duplicitous companies that are contributing to defeat Proposition 37 are also some of the largest member-donors to the Organic Trade Association (OTA), the trade-lobby group for the organic industry.  The OTA has long been criticized by public interest groups for its efforts to weaken the organic law and standards.

On the Board of Directors of the Organic Trade Association sit Julia Sabin (Smucker) and Kelly Shea (Dean Foods), both working for corporations that have contributed to the committee opposing Proposition 37.

“The Organic Trade Association lists brands as major donors, like Kashi, R.W. Knudsen, Cascadian Farm (General Mills) and others that are owned by corporations that financially contribute to defeating Proposition 37,” says Cornucopia’s Kastel.  “The OTA is in large part run by and funded by some of the same companies that are in bed with the biotechnology industry and its destructive agricultural practices.”

‘Entrepreneurial Nation’: How Made in America is Returning

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by Uttara Choudhury 
Sep 12, 2012 
New York: Ro Khanna, a former deputy assistant secretary of commerce in the White House and Congressional aspirant, thinks “Made in America” is making a comeback. In the 1970s, America’s manufacturing jobs in the steel, textile, electronics and car industries relocated first to Latin America and then to Asia. But the tide is turning, says Khanna’s new book Entrepreneurial Nation published by McGraw-Hill. 
Khanna, 36, practices technology law at Wilson Sonsini, a Silicon Valley law firm, and teaches economics at Stanford. His book is like a tour of the best of American manufacturing and lingers on the Silicon Valley model of entrepreneurism that he praises as a kind of recombinant DNA of talent.

Khanna argues that innovation of the kind found in Silicon Valley can continue to bolster US manufacturing and give it several advantages over countries like China, India, Korea and Brazil.

Khanna drills down one fact: Some of the world’s best products and biggest innovations are still being developed by Apple, Google and countless other US aerospace, defense and medical companies. High labour and productivity costs that gutted US manufacturing over the past decade have begun to alter. America’s advantage in productivity and technology is starting to weigh in its favour once again. As a result, new factories are coming up all over the country.

The book is on trend as manufacturing jobs are coming back to the US. Dow Chemical, Sauder Woodworking and GF AgieCharmilles have all brought overseas production back to the US in the past three years. Caterpillar is building a $120 million plant to make giant earthmovers in Texas, including some models that were previously built in Japan. French airliner, Airbus, has committed to building its first factory on US soil.

Master Lock, in Milwaukee, landed a visit from President Barack Obama after bringing manufacturing jobs back from China. Whirlpool is now building a new $200 million plant in Tennessee rather than sending the 1,500 jobs overseas.

“Against all odds, our nation held the global lead over China in manufacturing output until 2009. What’s extraordinary is that our aggregate output remains competitive with China’s, even though the sector constitutes only 10 percent of our economy compared to nearly 40 percent of theirs,” says the book.

“We are a global leader, in part, because our labour productivity (the value that a worker produces annually) is more than six times as large as China’s or India’s and significantly larger than Japan’s or Germany’s. Strong productivity has enabled the United States to increase its manufacturing output over the past 30 years to a greater extent than any other developed nation, more than doubling in size,” adds the book.

Khanna cites the story of Keith Busse, the CEO of a Midwestern company, Steel Dynamics, which makes rails, an occupation people thought was dead in America. He points out that due to labour efficiency and innovation Busse’s company thrives although he pays his people well: $30 an hour plus medical and other benefits.

Entrepreneurial Nation points out that manufactures in America get the job done by “really listening” to their clients. Khanna talks about how a fourth-generation business, the Globe Manufacturing Company, customised its firefighting suits to beat foreign competitors. Similarly, Vitamix worked with clients like Starbucks to produce a superior coffee blender. In the Bay Area, Khanna says, electric car firm Tesla, in Fremont, is “an example of how we can be innovative and creative.”

Khanna also lays out an agenda for keeping the “Made in America” label strong by suggesting tax reform. He says Congress should offer tax credits or five-year tax holidays for manufacturers to set up or expand factories in the US, with revenue exempt from corporate taxes “for a limited period.”

“Maybe Ro Khanna is not yet the Democrats’ answer to Paul Ryan. But you cannot read this book without concluding he has claimed a spot on the national stage as a man of ideas,” saidMercury News while reviewing Khanna’s book.

Source: FirstPost

ABOUT RO KHANNA 

Ro Khanna was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania in 1976, America’sbicentennial year.  He now lives in Fremont, California and has been involved in his local community for years. He developed a passion for public service from his family. His parents immigrated to this country to pursue the American dream. His father came to the University of Michigan to study engineering and still spends his Saturdays cheering for the Wolverines. His mother, a former substitute school teacher, raised him to believe that anything is possible in America. Ro’s commitment to service is rooted in his belief that the American dream that inspired his family should also inspire future generations. 

Check out his Economic Growth Agenda.  Stay connect and follow his efforts on Facebook.

10 Ways to Rejuvenate Your Brain While You Work

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Photo Credit | iStock

 

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Going to Africa–literally or figuratively–refreshes your brain, which helps you be alert, and propels you forward.
In his last column,  Geil Browning wrote about how I lead groups of volunteers to work with the Kenyan Children Foundation in Africa, and how we all return home exhausted but with our brains refreshed and renewed. We take a break from our usual ways of thinking, and open our minds to new ideas and experiences. But you don’t have to travel thousands of miles from home to recharge your brain.

As an entrepreneur, you probably work upwards of 60 hours a week. Forbes interviewed 20 entrepreneurs about their work habits, and found they worked an average of 60 to more than 100 hours per week. Most noted that weekdays were not much different than weekends, and that personal time off did not exist at all. One responded, “the concept of ‘work’ disappears–it is just what we do.”

As anyone who has crammed for an exam can tell you, usually the number of hours we work without interruption is inversely proportionate to how much we accomplish. So how do these entrepreneurs manage to work so many hours without suffering from brain fatigue?

Well, first of all, it is because they truly love being an entrepreneur and are passionate about their enterprise. But, I believe, part of the answer is that they wear so many hats. They never get stuck doing the same kind of work for too long.

Here are some more brain-based tips that can work wonders and could be what helps propel entrepreneurs forward:

1. Buy a good office chair, or get a standing desk. 
Focal Upright Furniture has a brand new chair and desk combination on the market. Invented by Martin Keen, of Keen shoes fame, it uses a position between sitting and standing, and allows lots of movement as you work. It also helps those who use it remain attentive.

2. Do not multi-task.
John Medina, author of Brain Rules, tells us the brain cannot multi-task, period. What it does do is switch back and forth between tasks very quickly. Someone whose attention is interrupted not only takes 50% longer to accomplish a task, but also makes up to 50% more errors. A study in The New England Journal of Medicine found that people who talk on the cell phone while driving are four times more likely to have an accident because it isn’t possible to devote your full attention to both driving and talking sy the same time. Hands-free calling offerd no advantage. What’s the lesson to take away? Focus on one task at a time and you’ll accomplish each better and faster–without killing anybody.

3. Use all your senses.
Work is more entertaining for your brain–and therefore makes you more alert–when you engage as many of your senses as possible. Use colored paper and pens. Experiment with peppermint, lemon, or cinnamon aromatherapy. Try playing background music.

4. Don’t make too many decisions in one day.
It sounds farfetched, but if you go shopping in the morning, then negotiate yourself out of eating a cookie at lunch, and finally try to decide between two job offers that afternoon, you might choose the wrong job because you didn’t eat the cookie, according to Scientific American. Making choices depletes your reserves of executive function, or “the mental system involved in abstract thinking, planning, and focusing on one thing instead of another.” This can adversely affect decisions you make later.

5. Take a quick break every 20 minutes.
A study in the journal Cognition reveals that people can maintain their focus or “vigilance” much longer when their brains are given something else to think about every 20 minutes. That’s the time when thinking becomes less efficient. This trick is called “momentary deactivation.” If your mind isn’t as sharp after a long period of work, it may not be completely fatigued. It just needs to focus on something else to refresh the specific neural network you’ve been using.

6. Work with your own circadian rhythms. 
Are you an early bird or a night owl? Do you fade every afternoon or is that when you are strongest? Don’t schedule an important meeting at a time when you will be operating on one cylinder. And don’t waste your peak work time at a doctor’s appointment.

7. Relax for 10 minutes every 90 minutes.
When you’re awake, your brain cycles from higher alertness (busy beta waves) to lower alertness (alpha waves) every 90 minutes. At that point you become less able to focus, think clearly, or see the big picture. You know the signals: you feel restless, hungry, and sleepy, and reach for a coffee. Herbert Benson of Harvard, author of The Relaxation Response, recommends working to the point where you stop feeling productive and start feeling stressed. At that moment, disengage. Meditate, do a relaxation exercise, pet a furry animal, go for a quick jog, take a hot shower, pick up your knitting, practice the piano, or look at paintings. Allowing your brain to go into a state of relaxation, daydreaming, and meditating will reset your alertness.

8. Take power naps.
Researchers have found the human ability to learn declines as the day wears on. But an afternoon power na increases scores on memory tests by 20%.

9. Experience nature–preferably real, but fake will do.
A walk in the park, a glance out the window at the trees, or even a view of nature photographs engages a different kind of attention than your normal work routine. According to a study titled “The Cognitive Benefits of Interacting with Nature,” nature engages our involuntary attention. We hear a bird song, feel a breeze, or notice the clouds moving across the sky in a manner known as effortless attention. We can concentrate much better after we have spent some time in a natural environment, or paid “effortless attention.” Walking around a city block doesn’t count, since that requires vigilance and directed attention, and does not give your brain a break.

10. Take a vacation.
One CEO recommends mountain biking because it forces you to stop thinking about the office and to instead concentrate on staying alive. You probably feel that you can’t possibly get away, but ultimately it will make you a better leader for your company.

Going to Africa–literally or figuratively–refreshes your brain, which allows you to be productive longer, and t
o tack
le more issues. Whether you need to review your budget, approve a new marketing initiative, or hire new people, you’ll have the new perspective and alert brain you need to be your best.

Source: INC.

9/11 Anniversary 2012: New York Ceremony Held For September 11

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By JENNIFER PELTZ 
09/11/12 08:09 AM ET  
NEW YORK — America gathered again Tuesday to mark the 11th anniversary of the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks with familiar ceremony, but also a sense that it’s time to move forward after a decade of remembrance. 
As in past years, thousands were expected to gather at the World Trade Center site in New York, the Pentagon and Shanksville, Pa., to read the names of nearly 3,000 victims killed in the worst terror attack in U.S. history. President Barack Obama was to attend the Pentagon memorial, and Vice President Joe Biden was to speak in Pennsylvania.

But many felt that last year’s 10th anniversary was an emotional turning point for public mourning of the attacks. For the first time, elected officials weren’t speaking at the ceremony, which often allowed them a solemn turn in the spotlight, but raised questions about the public and private Sept. 11.

“I feel much more relaxed” this year, said Jane Pollicino, who came to ground zero Tuesday morning to remember her husband, who was killed at the trade center. “After the ninth anniversary, that next day, you started building up to the 10th year. This feels a lot different, in that regard. It’s another anniversary that we can commemorate in a calmer way, without that 10-year pressure.”

Commuters rushed out of the subway and fewer police barricades were in place than in past years in the lower Manhattan neighborhood surrounding ground zero. But blocks from the site, Ron Patiro needed to consult with security guards about where he could walk his two dogs. “It’s still a military zone,” he said.

Families had a mixed reaction to the changing ceremony, keeping politicians away from the microphone in New York for the first time.

For Charles G. Wolf, it’s a fitting transition.

“We’ve gone past that deep, collective public grief,” says Wolf, whose wife, Katherine, was killed at the trade center. “And the fact that the politicians will not be involved, to me, makes it more intimate, for the families. … That’s the way that it can be now.”

But Pollicino said it’s important that politicians still attend the ceremony.

“There’s something missing if they’re not here at all,” she said. “Now, all of a sudden, it’s `for the families.’ This happened to our country – it didn’t happen only to me.”

Political leaders still are welcome to attend the ground zero ceremony, and they are expected at the other commemorations, as well.

President Obama and first lady Michelle Obama plan to attend the Pentagon ceremony and visit wounded soldiers at Walter Reed Army Medical Center. Biden and Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar are expected to speak at the Flight 93 National Memorial near Shanksville, at the site where the hijacked United Airlines plane went down.

Officeholders from the mayor to presidents have been heard at the New York ceremony, reading texts ranging from parts of the Declaration of Independence and the Gettysburg Address to poems by John Donne and Langston Hughes.

For former New York Gov. George Pataki, this year’s change ends a 10-year experience that was deeply personal, even as it reflected his political role. He was governor at the time of the attacks.

“As the names are read out, I just listen and have great memories of people who I knew very well who were on that list of names. It was very emotional,” Pataki reflected by phone last week. Among his friends who were killed was Neil Levin, the executive director of the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey.

But Pataki supports the decision not to have government figures speak.

“It’s time to take the next step, which is simply to continue to pay tribute,” Pataki said.

The National Sept. 11 Memorial and Museum – led by Mayor Michael Bloomberg as its board chairman – announced in July that this year’s ceremony would include only relatives reading victims’ names.

The point, memorial President Joe Daniels said, was “honoring the victims and their families in a way free of politics” in an election year.

Some victims’ relatives and commentators praised the decision. “It is time” to extricate Sept. 11 from politics, the Boston Globe wrote in an editorial.

But others said keeping politicians off the rostrum smacked of … politics.

The move came amid friction between the memorial foundation and the governors of New York and New Jersey over financing for the museum – friction that abruptly subsided Monday, when Bloomberg and New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo announced an agreement that paves the way for finishing the $700 million project “as soon as practicable.”

Before the deal, Cuomo, a Democrat, and New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, a Republican, had signaled their displeasure by calling on federal officials to give the memorial a financial and technical hand. Some victims’ relatives saw the no-politicians anniversary ceremony as retaliation.

“Banning the governors of New York and New Jersey from speaking is the ultimate political decision,” said one relatives’ group, led by retired Deputy Fire Chief Jim Riches. His firefighter son and namesake was killed responding to the burning World Trade Center.

Spokesmen for Christie and Cuomo said the governors were fine with the memorial organizers’ decision.

Of course, it’s difficult to remember 9/11 without remembering its impact on the nation’s political narrative.

After all, “9/11 has defined politics in America” since 2001, said Costas Panagopoulos, a Fordham University political science professor. “At the end of the day, 9/11 was a public tragedy that affected the nation as a whole.”

Source: Huffington Post
Follow Jennifer Peltz on Twitter: @jennpeltz

Associated Press writer Verena Dobnik contributed to this report.

Western Cattlemen Sue WTO & USA

By PHILIP A. JANQUART  
Thursday, September 06, 2012 

DENVER (CN) – Western ranchers sued the World Trade Organization in Federal Court, challenging its power to rule, as it did, that the U.S. Country of Origin Labeling Act discriminates against foreign meat. 
Made in the USA Foundation, the Ranchers-Cattlemen Action Legal Fund, United Stockgrowers Association, and Melonhead (a meat and vegetable distributor), sued the WTO, the United States and the U.S. Department of Agriculture.

     The U.S. Country of Origin Labeling Act, aka COOL, requires all fresh produce, meat, chicken and fish to be labeled to reveal its country of origin.

     The COOL Act, signed in 2002, led Canada and Mexico to file complaints with the WTO. Three WTO representatives, from Portugal, Pakistan and Switzerland, found that COOL violated the Uruguay Round of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade, and “imposes discriminatory burdens on meat imported from Canada and Mexico,” according to the complaint.

     The WTO’s Appellate Body affirmed the decision, finding that COOL, “particularly in regard to the muscle cut meat labels, is inconsistent with Article 2.1 of the TBT Agreement [Technical Barriers to Trade Agreement] because it accords less favorable treatment to imported livestock than to like domestic stock.”

     The cattlemen-plaintiffs object.

     “The Country of Origin Labeling Act is not a barrier to trade of any kind,” the complaint states. “It was passed to give consumers information about where agricultural products came from. Consumers could choose not to buy raspberries from Guatemala because of a bacterial problem there, or could refuse to buy Canadian beef because of a Mad Cow disease problem there.”

     Citing an unidentified “recent opinion poll,” the plaintiffs claim that 93 percent of U.S. consumers support the COOL Act.

     The cattlemen also claim that the Uruguay Round Agreement, signed into law by President Clinton in 1994, states that U.S. law prevails in any trade conflict between the U.S. and other countries.

     They claims that Section 102(a)(1) of the Uruguay Round states: “No provision of any of the Uruguay Round Agreement, nor the application of any such provision to any person or circumstance, that is inconsistent with any law of the United States shall have effect.”

     The complaint continues: “The ruling by the WTO Appellate Body that declares COOL is a violation of the TBT Agreement, which was executed pursuant to, or under the auspices of, the Uruguay Round Agreement, and that attempts to intimidate the U.S. into modifying COOL to conform to the WTO’s interpretation of the TBT Agreement is inconsistent with the U.S. COOL law. Under Section 102(a)(1), U.S. law prevails over the ruling of the WTO Appellate Body because of the conflict.”

     The cattlemen claim that their members will be harmed by the WTO’s actions.

     “Plaintiff R-CALF USA and its members are harmed by any dilution of the country of origin law and do not want their domestic meat confused by the consumer with meat from Canada and Mexico,” the complaint states.

     “Plaintiff Melonhead LLC is harmed by any weakening of country of origin legislation because it does not want Mexican and Canadian meat to be lumped together with meat from the United States. Melonhead’s customers desire U.S.-born, raised and processed beef and do no want confusion with Mexican and Canadian beef.”

     The cattlemen ask the court to declare that the WTO ruling has no authority to override U.S. law and that its “decision concerning the Country of Origin Labeling Act is void in the United States and throughout the world.”

     They also want the court to order Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack to do his “legal duty” to enforce COOL and to order U.S. Trade Representative Ron Kirk to cease and desist from negotiating with Canada and Mexico an amended and “watered-down” version of the Act.

     Both Vilsack and Kirk are named as defendants. The cattlemen claim Vilsack and Kirk have no “legal right to amend or contravene this law by regulations or negotiations.”

     The beef industry is represented by Joel Joseph, of Los Angeles.