Delgado, D- Rhinebeck, came to Otsego County on Tuesday, Feb. 22, to promote two House manufacturing bills: the CHIPS for America Act and the America COMPETES Act. He toured Ioxus, an ultracapacitor battery manufacturer in the Town of Oneonta, then led a panel discussion at SUNY Oneonta.
"We have to prioritize American goods ... because the competition out there is real," Delgado said at the start of the roundtable. He spoke in glowing terms about the two bills during a seven-minute speech. "The America COMPETES Act is a bold legislative package that makes transformational new investments in research innovation in American manufacturing, and sets the United States up for success for decades to come," he said. He used the words invest, America and manufacturing repeatedly, but did not go into specifics of the 3,000-page bill.
The American share of global semiconductor manufacturing capacity dropped from 37 percent in 1990 to 12 percent in 2020, because other nations have subsidized development while the U.S. has not, Delgado said, quoting a report from the Semiconductor Industry Association.
Rather than relying on countries such as China, "we need to invest in regional hubs, we need to make sure that we are building or creating and connecting educational institutions with workforce development programs or private enterprise" in order to "maximize the value proposition," he said.
The America COMPETES Act, which passed the House in early February on a party-line vote, has two main sections. It would include $160 billion for scientific research and funding for federal science programs such as the National Science Foundation; it also allocates $52 billion to semiconductor research and manufacturing to increase domestic production, and recommends an additional $45 billion appropriation for supply chain infrastructure.
The CHIPS for America Act passed in 2021 without funding; the COMPETES Act would provide capital to fund CHIPS and support the semiconductor industry, according to Forbes magazine.
House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, R- Calif., called the bill " the America Concedes Act," in a speech on Feb. 2, arguing that ineffectual provisions intended to strengthen U.S. industry would in fact make the country more vulnerable to Chinese imports.
The COMPETES Act is the House version of the Senate's more bipartisan 2021 U.S. Innovation and Competition Act. A congressional conference committee will draft a compromise bill that could pass both chambers.
At SUNY Oneonta, Delgado moderated and took notes while seven panelists gave brief talks about the importance of manufacturing for creating employment, and the importance of training and recruiting employees to support manufacturers.
Ioxus founder Chad Hall discussed the perception that manufacturing and trade jobs are not desirable careers.
"Everybody wants to be an engineer or something fancy and makes a lot of money. Manufacturing is basic," he said. "Being able to fill those local roles are really, really difficult. People just don't seem to be interested. We put ads up constantly, we've had five positions open for over a year. We get people that come for a week or two. And it's not quite what they wanted. They want something fancier."
"Folks are more apt to look for something that they find personally rewarding in their career, not just a paycheck. And I think all employers across the board need to realize that," said Sean Lewis, president of the Otsego County Chamber of Commerce. "How do we, as employers, market the opportunity to work with us, not for us, in an environment that is beneficial to them — financially, personally, emotionally? Everyone's life was turned upside down, and they just don't view working the way they did before the pandemic."
Denise Zieske, director of workforce development for the SUNY system talked about the role of social services to assist employees who "are one step away from not being able to go to work. They may have a flat tire, and they can't afford to get their car fixed. They may have child care issues. So I think another big piece that needs to be built into this is, how do we give the supports that these people need, to be able to continue on in their education and in their jobs?"
"Money goes to money," Hall said. "When we put together grant requests for some of these applications, it's clear that Binghamton, Albany, Syracuse have just tremendous resources that they can throw on these things ... But we raised a lot of financing, a lot of capital over the years, on our little company. It can be done, if there's a demand for the product."
"This area has the capability to grow a lot, and has the space to grow a lot, and also the water," Lewis said.
After the event, SUNY Oneonta President Alberto Cardelle talked about needing to keep building ties between the colleges and the community.
"What we can do here is partner better, right, and not be seen as an institution where students come from New York and Long Island only, and come in here and you know, go to school, and then go back," he said. He gave the example of education majors who "do student teaching in local districts. A lot of them stay, and they stay because they've set there. They work with other teachers, they already have a network. There's demand there, right? Because they need teachers. All we need to do is replicate that model."
©2022 The Daily Star (Oneonta, N.Y.). Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.
