'Do We Want To Hear The Bad News First Or The Good News First?': JD Vance Discusses Economic Plans

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In remarks to Vantage Plastics in Bay City, Michigan, Vice President JD Vance spoke about the state of manufacturing in the U.S. and President Trump's plans to increase it.  Fuel your success with Forbes. Gain unlimited access to premium journalism, including breaking news, groundbreaking in-depth reported stories, daily digests and more. Plus, members get a front-row seat at members-only events with leading thinkers and doers, access to premium video that can help you get ahead, an ad-light experience, early access to select products including NFT drops and more:  https://account.forbes.com/membership/?utm_source=youtube&utm_medium=display&utm_campaign=growth_non-sub_paid_subscribe_ytdescript   Stay Connected Forbes on Facebook: http://fb.com/forbes Forbes Video on Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/forbes Forbes Video on Instagram: http://instagram.com/forbes More From Forbes:  http://forbes.com

Transcript

00:00Now, y'all don't hold it against me, of course, you know that I'm from that state, just one

00:10state south, but we know in the industrial Midwest that companies like Vantage give Great

00:19Lakes states the reputation that we know it is the powerhouse of American industry and

00:24that makes it the powerhouse of world industry.

00:27I'm grateful for the good-paying jobs this company brings to the area and for the incredible

00:33job this business does generating economic opportunity in this region of our country.

00:40And I really do believe that America's success depends on the success of companies like Vantage

00:46Plastics.

00:47Now, I don't mean that in some abstract, poetic-sounding sense, I mean it literally.

00:52If we do not protect our nation's manufacturers, we lose a fundamental part of who we are

00:58as a people.

01:00Making things, building things, working with our hands is America's heritage and that heritage

01:06is alive and well in this facility.

01:11Now, our frontier spirit would have done us little good in conquering the continent if

01:21we couldn't manufacture the railway track, the steamboats, the dynamite, and everything

01:26else needed to do so.

01:29American industry, American workers famously won the Second World War.

01:34American industry took us to the moon and enabled the Silicon Revolution that created

01:38the most precise and sophisticated jobs imaginable in any field, demanding mechanical expertise

01:46on the scale of nanometers, which is so small you can't even see it.

01:51But over the years, I hate to say it, we have squandered that heritage in the United

01:55States of America.

01:56Not in Vantage Plastics, thank God, but all across our country.

02:00Between the 1990s and the election of Donald Trump the first time back in 2016, this country

02:06lost 5 million good manufacturing jobs.

02:11And we saw over 90,000 American factories, great American factories, shut their doors.

02:18And as I know I don't have to tell anyone here today, when we lose the ability to make

02:22our own stuff, we abandon a way of life, one that has sustained towns like Bay Cities and

02:28countless other communities from Middletown, Ohio to a ton of communities all across the

02:33Midwest.

02:34Being able to make things is good because it creates self-sufficiency as a nation and

02:39it creates self-sufficiency in our people.

02:42And more importantly, manufacturing jobs are good for our workers.

02:46We know this.

02:47You all know this.

02:48They pay a premium of 10% compared to wages in other fields and other roles.

02:53They often come with the good benefits and the good job creation that drives the kind

03:00of economic opportunity that we want to see in our country.

03:03When we de-industrialize, when we lose those good jobs that allow us to support families,

03:09those are the kinds of things that we lose.

03:12And I think that we need a president, and thank God we have a president, that thinks

03:16we're going to bring it back, and we are.

03:26So I've got, you know, I've got some bad news and I've got some good news.

03:29Do we want to hear the bad news first or the good news first?

03:32Okay, that's good.

03:35You all said bad news, and that's good because if you had said good news, that would have

03:38totally screwed up the flow of this speech.

03:41I got to start with the bad news a little bit, then we talk about the good news.

03:45But here's the simple truth.

03:47The very simple truth is that, unfortunately, the last administration left us with a terrible

03:54economy.

03:55They left us with sky-high prices.

03:58They left us with home values that had doubled in just four short years, meaning a lot of

04:03American families couldn't afford to buy or to rent a home.

04:08They left us with a historic debt crisis.

04:10Did you know that in the history of the United States of America, we have never had deficits

04:16and debt so high as we had under Joe Biden's leadership?

04:20And what did all that peacetime debt and deficit, what did all that spending, what did all that

04:27waste and fraud get us?

04:29It got us an economy where Americans couldn't afford to buy a home, our families couldn't

04:33afford to buy groceries, and our people felt like the American dream was slipping away.

04:39Now that is the bad news, but now we can talk a little bit about the good news, because

04:44I'm proud to say that thanks to all of you, on January 20th, 2025, we started a great

04:51American comeback.

05:02Last November, America reelected a president with a simple goal, to power our nation's

05:08industrial comeback, and once again, make the U.S. the world's manufacturing superpower,

05:14and that is exactly what President Trump has sought out to do.

05:18Now I have to be honest with you, the road ahead of us is long, but we are already, in

05:22just seven short weeks, starting to see early indications of the president's vision becoming

05:29our shared American reality.

05:32This February, the president's first full month in office, America gained 10,000 American

05:38manufacturing jobs.

05:39Now compare that to last year, when under the Biden administration, we were losing an

05:43average of about 10,000 manufacturing jobs per month.

05:48That's over 100,000 jobs and manufacturing lost in a single year under Joe Biden, and

05:55we've got to ask ourselves, what has driven the turnaround?

05:59Well, first of all, President Trump has been clear about his plan, about our administration's

06:05plan, our goal is to make it easier and more affordable to make things again in the United

06:11States of America.

06:12If you invest in America, in American jobs, in American workers, and in American businesses,

06:18you're going to be rewarded.

06:20We're going to cut your taxes, we're going to slash regulations, and we're going to reduce

06:24the cost of energy to build things right here in this country that all of us love.

06:29But if you try to undercut us and build outside of our borders, the President Trump's administration

06:36has got nothing for you.

06:38If you want to be rewarded, build in America.

06:41If you want to be penalized, build outside of America.

06:44It's as simple as that.

06:45So, if you've gotten rich the last few decades by ripping off U.S. companies and preying

07:02on American workers, well, the President is simply telling you the jig is up.

07:06If you want to manufacture in China, which has the worst and most punitive economic policies

07:12towards us anywhere in the world, then you are going to have to pay the consequences.

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