President Barack Obama recently met with 11 executives from both U.S. and foreign firms to talk about investment in American business. The executives represented companies that already have investments in the U.S., according to The Wall Street Journal. They included Michael Penner, president of the Canadian Richelieu Group, which purchased a clothing company in North Carolina in 2011.
“This U.S. manufacturing resurgence is not a fad and not a flash in the pan. It’s a very serious movement,” Penner told the news source.
Within two weeks, Richelieu’s $7 million investment led to the hiring of many workers who had been laid off, according to HeraldOnline.com. The White House hopes that courting foreign investors will lead to more jobs for Americans. According to The Associated Press, President Obama is currently seeking to convince ASCO Industries, a Belgian aerospace company, to build a $125 million factory in Stillwater, Oklahoma, with the hope of increasing employment in the area.
President Obama has an even loftier goal of gaining $1 trillion in foreign investments before 2020. One program helping to reach that number is SelectUSA, started in 2011, which allows officials of the federal government to work with U.S. cities and states promoting their opportunities to foreign investors.