Free Republic

Eighteen states on Tuesday sued President Trump’s administration over its push to “reconsider” greenhouse-gas-emission rules for the nation’s auto fleet, launching a legal battle over one of Barack Obama’s most significant efforts to address climate change. Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Scott Pruitt in April said he would revisit the Obama-era rules, which aim to raise efficiency requirements to about 50 miles per gallon by 2025. Pruitt’s agency said that the standards are “based on outdated information” and that new data suggests “the current standards may be too stringent.” But in the lawsuit, the states contend that the EPA acted “arbitrarily...

Halsey Taylor is one of the leading manufacturers of drinking fountains today. Company founder Halsey W. Taylor invented the non-squirting drinking fountain. In 1896, Taylor's father died from typhoid fever. This illness is principally spread through contaminated drinking water. Several years later, while working as a plant superintendent for the Packard Motor Car Company, Taylor realized numerous workers were becoming sick with dysentery. He believed contaminated drinking water was the chief reason for the spreading illness. Taylor determined to develop a drinking fountain that was sanitary and would not contribute to the spreading of various illnesses. By 1912, he had...

The Trump administrationÂ’s new tariffs on steel and aluminum from abroad could result in more than five jobs lost for every single job gained, according to an analysis from a group that advocates free trade.The job losses will be direct and indirect, as price hikes will hit American companies that buy international steel to make screws, wires, and machines, Laura M. Baughman, president of the Trade Partnership, said Friday during a Heritage Foundation event.The Trade Partnership anticipates a net loss of 146,000 U.S. jobs, Baughman said.On Thursday, President Donald Trump announced steel tariffs of 25 percent and aluminum tariffs of...

Trump's tariffs are a bad idea. President Donald Trump deserves applause for boosting the prospects for this country’s forgotten manufacturing workers, particularly in the steel and aluminum industries. Democrats lately have neglected these Americans. Hillary Clinton barely campaigned among them in Michigan during the 2016 general election, and she thoroughly ignored them in Wisconsin. Alas, President Trump is doing this all wrong. He likely will hurt the very middle class that he has championed since his escalator ride onto the political stage. Trump aims to protect U.S. metal makers with new taxes of 25 percent on foreign steel and 10...

When President Trump announced he would protect American jobs by imposing tariffs on foreign-made steel and aluminum, naysayers of both parties rushed to the nearest microphone or TV camera. Pundits and politicians alike pretended to be “shocked, shocked” that Trump meant what he said as a candidate, and that he actually means to deliver what he promised during the campaign. The Swamp, in short, is not happy. But cheers rose from the manufacturing belt that runs through the states that put Trump in the White House: Pennsylvania, Ohio, Michigan, Indiana, Wisconsin, and Iowa. “This is a good thing for...

Sweden’s Electrolux (ELUXb.ST), Europe’s largest home appliance maker, said on Friday it would delay a planned $250 million investment in Tennessee, after U.S. President Donald Trump announced tariffs on imported aluminum and steel. On Thursday, Trump said the duties — 25 percent on steel imports and 10 percent on aluminum — would be formally announced next week, although White House officials later said some details still needed to be ironed out. “We are putting it on hold. We believe that tariffs could cause a pretty significant increase in the price of steel on the U.S. market,” Electrolux spokesman Daniel Frykholm...

A recent article in The Guardian dons the foreboding title "Robots will destroy our jobs -- and we're not ready for it." The article claims, "For every job created by robotic automation, several more will be eliminated entirely. ... This disruption will have a devastating impact on our workforce." According to an article in MIT Technology Review, business researchers Erik Brynjolfsson and Andrew McAfee believe that rapid technological change has been destroying jobs faster than it is creating them, contributing to the stagnation of median income and the growth of inequality in the United States. If technology is destroying jobs...

Remington Outdoor announced plans to file for bankruptcy on Monday, succumbing to a “Trump slump” that whacked sales by 30 percent in its most recent quarter. https://nypost.com/2018/02/12/gunmaker-remington-filing-for-bankruptcy/

U.S. firearm manufacturer, Remington Outdoor Company, said it will file for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection, but stay in business throughout the process. "Difficult industry conditions make today's agreement prudent," said Jim Geisler, Remington's executive chairman, in a statement released by the company on Monday.

Harley-Davidson Inc. announced early Tuesday with its fourth quarter 2017 earnings report that it is on track to launch its first electric motorcycle within 18 months and that it will invest more aggressively in the electric avenue in an attempt to inspire ridership. But on the flip side, the motorcycle manufacturer also revealed plans to close its Kansas City, Mo., plant and fold those operations into its Pennsylvania facility. The Milwaukee-based company's (NYSE: HOG) announcement on its significant commitment to the future of its motorcycle technology and plant closure comes as motorcycle sales fell 6.7 percent worldwide in 2017, with...

Last month, the National Association of Manufacturers (NAM) released a survey showing that nearly 95 percent of manufacturing companies are optimistic about the futures of their businesses and the economy. Count me among them.The Dayton-based company that my sister Sandy Keplinger and I own — a contract metal fabrication company called Staub Manufacturing Solutions — just had an incredible year. Sandy and I expect an even better 2018. And, as is often the case in the history of American enterprise, our success is becoming everyone’s success. It is benefiting our employees and their families. It is helping our suppliers and customers. It is...

(Reuters) - Fiat Chrysler Automobiles NV FCH.MI (FCAU.N) said on Thursday it would invest more than $1 billion in its Michigan plant and add 2,500 jobs as it benefits from the overhaul of the U.S. tax code. The company said it would spend the money to modernize the Warren Truck Assembly Plant in Michigan to produce its Ram Heavy Duty trucks. The company will relocate the truck’s production from its current location in Saltillo, Mexico, to the Michigan plant in 202O. The car maker also said it would make a special bonus payment of $2,000 to about 60,000 FCA hourly...

Donald Trump wants more companies — foreign and domestic — to produce goods in the United States. We spoke to German companies already in the US about whether they’ll take the bait. Jim Sheak remembers the good old days when Akron, Ohio, was a major manufacturing hub. The tire company Goodyear was founded here back in 1898, giving it the nickname Rubber City. Then, one by one in the past three decades, Goodyear and companies like it reduced their presence or pulled out entirely. Akron, like many Rust Belt cities, was left with empty factories and a shrinking population. Ironically,...

(Reuters) - Alabama will be the site of a new $1.6 billion Toyota Motor Corp and Mazda Motor Corp auto plant, a victory for President Donald Trump who had prodded manufacturers to build new U.S. facilities and threatened tariffs on foreign production, sources said on Tuesday.

Boeing delivered a record number of commercial airplanes last year, the company reported Tuesday, firing up a rally in the company's stock. The aerospace giant delivered 763 planes, one more than its previous high set in 2015. The company's stock rallied after the report, closing up 2.7 percent at $318.43 and leading the Dow industrials higher. Boeing, whose shares have more than doubled over the last 12 months, said it booked orders for 912 commercial airplanes, the seventh highest annual total for the company.

Now that we are a full year into President Trump’s increasingly consequential first term, it is long past time to give him complete ownership of the American economy. If it seems odd to do so after only a year, that is due to former President Barack Obama, who never stopped blaming his predecessor for a recovery that never arrived because Obama could not stop sabotaging it with his anti-growth policies and anti-free market rhetoric. Even lying conspiracy theorists in the media and Democrat Party backed by a special prosecutor, even the gale force wind of hate and lies, have not...

<p>A household appliance will be the next stepping stone on America’s path to restored greatness. The government is poised to punish many Americans, in the name of protecting a few of them, because, in the government’s opinion, too many of them are choosing to buy foreign-made washing machines for no better reason than that the buyers think they are better. If you are wondering why the government is squandering its dwindling prestige by having opinions about such things, you have not been paying attention to Whirlpool’s demonstration that it is more adept at manipulating Washington than it is at making washing machines.</p>

Employment in manufacturing in the United States has increased by 189,000 in the year since Donald Trump was elected president, according to data released today by the Bureau of Labor Statistics. At the same time, employment in the federal government has declined by 3,000 since Trump was elected. In November 2016, there were 12,325,000 people employed in manufacturing in the United States. By this November, that had climbed to 12,514,000. “Since a recent low in November 2016, manufacturing employment has increased by 189,000,” the BLS said in the press release it put out this morning with the November employment numbers....

SAS Automotive Systems is coming to Tuscaloosa County, bringing 170 jobs. The German-based global auto supplier, which assembles cockpit modules, will support production of Mercedes-Benz's next generation SUV in Alabama. The Tuscaloosa County Industrial Development Authority (TCIDA) made the announcement, along with the Alabama Department of Commerce. SAS COO Francois Barthel said in a statement that company is "more than happy to contribute to the great success story of Alabama's auto production that started right in the very plant where we will be supplying components for Mercedes-Benz's next generation of SUVs." Mercedes is currently wrapping up a $1.3 billion expansion...

Fewer Millennials and youth in Generation Z are moving out of their parents’ homes than in recent previous generations. For the first time in the modern era, more 18- to 34-year olds live with their parents than in any other type of arrangement. That percentage reached its lowest point 45 years ago. In 1960, 62 percent of the nation’s 18- to 34-year-olds were living with a spouse or partner in their own household, and only one-in-five were living with their parents. How did this happen? The younger generations are used to their parents providing them with iPhones and cars. They’re...