AC Week in review: June 22, 2014

With the oncoming election, I sent over just a little bit less to my friends at AC – I’m hoping to make up for it next week once that fun and frivolity is complete and we can take a breather for a bit. Luckily, as I’ll note in a little bit, some of my fellow contributors picked up the slack.

But first I want to note that there are a number of good new jobs in America, particularly in the energy field. I took notice of one organization which is promoting a website to highlight these opportunities. Yet like any other field of work, manufacturing is at the mercy of policy uncertainty, a point which fellow AC writer Ed Braxton touches on in his look at the subject.

In an update to a story I’ve been following on the American Certified page, more members of Congress are demanding the Commerce Department take action against dumping of steel products by South Korea. In the article I pointed out an approved pipeline project in North Dakota, but hundreds of miles of new and retrofit piping could be affected.

I also began a two-part series on the fate of the Export-Import Bank of the United States, a little-known financial institution which has a big role in American manufacturing. It’s likely Part Two will roll out tomorrow, so stay tuned for that.

Finally, I’m not a guy who has the patience to sit in a deer stand or quietly await the presence of a wild turkey – but I know a 14-year-old who can’t wait to experience the former and did the latter during turkey season this spring. So this article by fellow AC contributor George Pitsakis may be something to check out if you enjoy the thrill of the hunt – apparently you’re in a growing industry, and one (I may add) ripe for opportunity to purchase American-made products. A search for “hunting” on the AC site netted almost 10,000 products.

Later this afternoon I’ll return you to the two-part series I started yesterday, but you can read this not-quite-so-political stuff in the interim.