WASHINGTON — The Senate voted to review and debate the Bring Jobs Home Act, a proposal that would provide incentives for manufacturers to create jobs in the U.S. Wednesday.
The Act was originally co-sponsored by Senator Jeff Merkley (D-OR).
“It closes tax loopholes that subsidize the cost to corporations of shipping jobs overseas and it created a new tax incentive to bring jobs home,” Merkley says.
He adds that returning manufacturing jobs will especially benefit Oregon.
“I think that’s something that catches people off-guard. They don’t think of Oregon and go, ‘Oh, Oregon- that’s the state that relies on manufacturing more than any other state.’ And yet we’ve been one of the top-one or -two states in that position, so this is a very big deal for us.”
Merkley says that also Oregon leads the nation in net jobs lost, with 50,000 jobs gone in the last ten years. Yet under the current law, he says, American taxes continue to reward companies who take American jobs away.
“What nation would want to subsidize the loss of living wage jobs? That defies common sense,” Merkley says.
Senator Merkley says he is optimistic for the Act, which had failed to make it to the Senate floor last year but earned nearly double the vote this time around.
Click here to read the Act in its entirety.
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