Leading Economist on How “UAW Strike Offers Ford’s Chinese Battery Plant an Easy Way Out”
INTERVIEW ON THE PRICE OF BUSINESS SHOW, MEDIA PARTNER OF THIS SITE.
Recently Kevin Price, Host of the nationally syndicated Price of Business Show, interviewed Diana Furchtgott-Roth.
“With Ford’s announcement that it would suspend work on its $3.5 billion Michigan–China battery partnership due to the United Auto Workers strike, the beleaguered company may have extricated itself from a political briar bush.
“The proposed Marshall, Mich., plant is planned in cooperation with Chinese battery behemoth Contemporary Amperex Technology Co. Ltd. (CATL), one of the world’s largest battery producers. But Congress allocated over $7 billion in electric-vehicle tax incentives in the Inflation Reduction Act for domestic, not Chinese, production.
“Ford located the enterprise in Michigan when Virginia governor Glenn Youngkin decided to remove his commonwealth from competition for the plant, on the grounds that such an alliance was against American interests. Macauley Porter, a Youngkin spokesperson, said to the Detroit News, ‘While Ford is an iconic American company, it became clear that this proposal would serve as a front for the Chinese Communist party, which could compromise our economic security and Virginians’ personal privacy.’
“Youngkin was prescient, because Ford has been under attack for the partnership ever since Michigan governor Gretchen Whitmer’s enthusiastic welcome. The core of the problem: Beijing would have some control over both the technology and the factory operations at the plant, as well as scooping up millions in IRA tax credits designed to make America less reliant on China.
“China dominates battery technology, accounting for over 70 percent of global electric-vehicle-battery-production capacity. CATL, as the largest producer in the industry, profits from close relations with the Chinese Communist Party (CCP).”
According to a statement, “Diana Furchtgott-Roth is director of the Center for Energy, Climate, and Environment and the Herbert and Joyce Morgan Fellow in Energy and Environmental Policy at The Heritage Foundation. She is an Oxford-educated economist, a frequent guest on TV and radio shows, and a columnist for Forbes.
“Diana worked in senior roles in the White House under Presidents Reagan, George H.W. Bush, and George W. Bush. She has served as Deputy Assistant Secretary for Research and Technology at the U.S. Department of Transportation; Acting Assistant Secretary for Economic Policy at the U.S. Department of Treasury; Chief Economist at the U.S. Department of Labor; Chief of Staff of the President’s Council of Economic Advisers; and Deputy Executive Secretary of the White House Domestic Policy Council.
“Diana is the author or coauthor of six books and hundreds of articles on economic policy, most recently United States Income, Wealth, Consumption, and Inequality (Oxford University Press, 2021). She received degrees in economics from Swarthmore College and Oxford University.”
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LISTEN TO THE INTERVIEW IN ITS ENTIRETY HERE:
