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      • Small Business Administration

Monthly Archives : January 2020

Washington DC – January 2020

by Maggie Lagueon 29 January 2020in Uncategorized

With the new Congressional session in full swing, Congressman Langevin has returned to Washington and remains focused on working for the people. While he is eager to continue advocating for Rhode Island’s Second Congressional District, I want to share some of our accomplishments from 2019.

Last year, the House of Representatives considered and passed important legislation to cut high health care costs, raise wages, protect our elections, and more.  As a part of these efforts, Congressman Langevin authored 27 bills and amendments and cosponsored 276 pieces of legislation.

Important work was done on the ground in Rhode Island as well. Our Constituent Service Representatives resolved problems for 637 constituents, helping address a wide range of matters from Social Security to veterans affairs. The office also helped procure over $2 million in benefits and savings for Rhode Islanders in need and helped secure over $526 million in federal grants for the District.

Lastly, to hear directly from Rhode Islanders about the most pressing issues and how to help, Congressman Langevin participated in 215 public events, including four as part of the “Lunch with Langevin” series. Further, we continued to engage 440 community leaders like you across eight advisory committees.

Our work is far from over, but we have much to be proud of. We’ve entered the new decade ready to help in any way that we can.

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Real Jobs RI Really Works

by Maggie Lagueon 17 January 2020in Uncategorized

Also published on the Providence Journal

The biggest challenge Rhode Island companies face is finding skilled workers to hire. We’d know–together, we represent some of the biggest industries in our state and employ more than 40,000 Rhode  Islanders. And while our companies and business models are very different, we’ve shared an experience for the last few decades: in times of both high and low unemployment, through economic booms and recessions, we have struggled to fill open positions that require specialized skillsets.

Fifty years ago, people could graduate from high school, immediately enter the workforce and earn a family-supporting income. But our economy has changed. Today, many companies–including our own–offer exciting, good-paying jobs with paths for career growth, but they demand particular skills beyond what students learn in high school or even in some college programs.

Rhode Island has a long history of experimenting with job training programs as a way to bridge that divide. Before Governor Raimondo created Real Jobs Rhode Island in 2015, few achieved any significant measure of success. Before Real Jobs RI, state leaders created and ran job training programs in a silo, without assessing the specific needs of the business community or the state of our workforce. People were given training that didn’t match up with what employers were actually looking for and struggled to find good-paying jobs in their new field. Rhode Island stayed stuck.

Real Jobs RI changed that. Under the Real Jobs RI model, business is brought in not only as a partner, but as an active participant in the program. Curriculum isn’t developed by some government official who’s never worked in the field, it’s being created by actual Rhode Island employers looking to fill vacant positions at their companies.

To date, more than 6,000 Rhode Islanders have gone through Real Jobs RI. The program’s track record is impressive: more than 80% of trainees are offered jobs immediately after completion. The Manufacturing sector relies strongly on Real Jobs.  Real jobs provides the basics and allows our businesses to then train them to their specific needs.

Every Real Jobs RI program is different, which makes sense: careers in advanced manufacturing, defense and health care require different skills. And it’s not just our industries that are represented. Real Jobs RI supports sectors driving our state’s economy with programs in health care, construction, defense, tech, design, manufacturing and countless others [will play with this depending on who the eventual companies are].

For businesses like ours, Real Jobs RI is revolutionary. The program allows us to hire new workers, retrain and promote current employees, and double down on our commitment to doing business in this state we love.

As two of the more than 1,000 employers served by Real Jobs, we ask the Governor and General Assembly for increased funding in this year’s budget. It’s rare for a program to benefit workers, employers and the state at the same time. But Real Jobs RI really does. Every dollar gives Rhode Island workers the opportunity to start or further an exciting career. Every dollar gives businesses like ours the skilled workforce we desperately need to grow. Simply put, Real Jobs RI is a win-win.

Real Jobs RI is one of the most innovative and successful job training programs in the country. Let’s ensure its future by expanding investments today.

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Industry Week – January 2020

by Maggie Lagueon 7 January 2020in Newsletter Articles

National Association of Manufacturers Chief Economist Chad Moutray, however, commented in a statement that the report marked a “rebound” for manufacturing. He said that manufacturers are now seeing slow-moving “signs of stabilization,” and urged the United States to ratify USMCA, make progress on negotiations with China, and reauthorize the Export-Import bank long-term in order to keep the stabilization “on track.”

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PMPA – January 2020

by Maggie Lagueon 7 January 2020in Newsletter Articles

Federal Overtime Salaried Employees Change:

Employees who make less than $35,568 are now eligible for
overtime pay under a final rule issued today by the U.S. Department of Labor
(DOL). The new rate will take effect Jan. 1, 2020. To be exempt from overtime
under the federal Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA), employees must be paid a
salary of at least the threshold amount and meet certain duties tests. If they
are paid less or do not meet the tests, they must be paid 1 1/2 times their
regular hourly rate for hours worked in excess of 40 in a workweek. Under the
new rule, nondiscretionary bonuses and incentive payments (including
commissions) paid on an annual or more frequent basis may be used to satisfy up
to 10 percent of the standard salary level.

In addition to raising the salary cutoff for exempt workers, the new
rule raises the threshold for highly compensated employees from $100,000 a year
to $107,432 (of which $684 must be paid weekly on a salary or fee basis). The
increase is about $40,000 less than what the DOL initially proposed because it
is based on the 80th percentile, rather than the 90th percentile, of all
full-time salaried workers’ earnings nationwide.

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Bloomberg – January 2020

by Maggie Lagueon 7 January 2020in Newsletter Articles

United
States factory production rebounded by more than forecast in November and rose
excluding a surge in auto production following the end of the General Motors
Co. strike, in a sign of stabilization in manufacturing.

  • The 1.1% increase in manufacturing output, the
    biggest gain since early 2018, followed a 0.7% decrease in October, Federal
    Reserve data showed Tuesday, topping the median estimate of economists for a
    0.8% gain. The increase is welcome to manufacturers, who have faced
    headwinds throughout the year including persistent trade- policy uncertainty
    and slowing global demand. Even with the gain in November, though, factory
    output fell 0.8% from a year earlier, and figures were revised lower for
    September and October, indicating that activity remains relatively subdued.
    This month’s proposed initial trade accord between the U.S. and China could
    bode well for output in 2020 if confidence improves.

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Capital Hill – January 2020

by Maggie Lagueon 7 January 2020in Newsletter Articles

Whitehouse introduced the American Business Tariff Relief Act last year to address concerns raised by Rhode Island businesses regarding the process for companies to apply for exclusions from increased tariffs.  The legislation would require the U.S. Trade Representative and the Department of Commerce to establish a process under which U.S. businesses can request exclusions from increased tariffs prior to the imposition of the new tariffs.

Whitehouse has also introduced No Tax Breaks for Outsourcing Act to level the playing field for American companies by ensuring that multinationals pay the same tax rate on profits earned abroad as they do in the United States.  The legislation would end incentives created by President Trump’s tax law to outsource jobs and shift profits offshore.

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NAM – January 2020

by Maggie Lagueon 6 January 2020in Newsletter Articles

Manufacturing
employment jumped by 54,000 workers in November, bouncing back from the loss of
43,000 employees in October. Much of that volatility stemmed from the effects
of the auto strike, with motor vehicles and parts employment up 41,300 in November,
rebounding from a similar loss in the prior report.

There were 12,865,000 manufacturing workers in November, the best reading in 11 years, with 1,412,000 employees added since the end of the Great Recession. Nonetheless, manufacturing job growth has slowed to an average of just more than 5,000 additional workers per month year to date. That contrasts with the average of 22,800 manufacturing employees created each month through the first 11 months of 2018.

  • The
    ISM®
    Manufacturing Purchasing Managers’ Index®

    contracted for the fourth straight month, suggesting ongoing weaknesses in
    the sector in November. While production contracted for the month, it
    stabilized somewhat in the latest data, falling at a slower rate and
    bouncing back from the worst reading since April 2009.
  • New
    orders for manufactured goods
    rose 0.3%
    in October, but were flat with defense sales excluded. Overall, the data
    continue to highlight weaknesses in the manufacturing sector across the
    past 12 months, with global softness and trade uncertainties weighing on
    activity and factory orders down 1.2% since October 2018. On a more
    positive note, core capital goods spending—a proxy for capital spending—rose
    1.1% in October, perhaps a sign of some stabilization in the measure.

 The Institute for Supply Management® reported that manufacturing activity contracted for the fifth straight month, falling to the lowest level since June 2009. Indeed, even as other measures have shown some stabilization in the sector, the headline index from ISM® declined from 48.1 in November to 47.2 in December.

This suggested that the manufacturing sector remained weak in December, with continued sales and export challenges and only cautious optimism for the coming months, according to the sample comments in the ISM® report.

United States manufacturers expect to reduce capital spending in 2020, a trend that could limit a rebound in the sector even as companies see profits improving.

Factory
executives forecast capital expenditures will decrease 2.1% in 2020, which if
realized would be the first annual decline in 11 years, according to a
semiannual survey from the Institute for Supply Management released Monday.
That compares to a reported increase of 6.4% in 2019. Managers at
non-manufacturing firms expect a 1.3% rise next year, slower than 2019’s
increase of 2%. While the group’s monthly data show the manufacturing sector is
currently contracting, the report indicates a turnaround may begin in the first
half of 2020 and pick up later in the year. Factories remain in a fragile
position after tumbling into recession earlier this year, though concerns have
abated that the weakness will spread into the broader economy amid strong job
gains.

Even so,
companies across the economy have held off on long-term investments amid
uncertain trade policies, escalating tariffs and a moderating growth outlook.
The pullback weighed on economic growth in both the second and third quarters.

Continue Reading

Recent Posts

  • Manufacturing Labor Productivity Rose 3.0%
  • Factory Orders Rose 1.1% in December
  • ISM® Manufacturing Purchasing Managers’ Index® slowed in January
  • US Economy Adds 49,000 Workers
  • Manufacturing Employment Falls in January

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