Friday, April 04, 2014WASHINGTON -- An amendment by U.S. Sen. Sherrod Brown to establish a tax credit to create manufacturing jobs in communities that have suffered significant manufacturing jobs loss was included in legislation approved Thursday by a committee and passed on to the Senate for full debate.
Brown’s amendment, based on his Manufacturing Communities Investment Act and the success of the New Markets Tax Credit, provides incentives for developers to invest in low income areas. Brown’s amendment and an extension of the general New Markets Tax Credit, was included in the Expiring Provisions Improvement Reform and Efficiency Act.
“In manufacturing communities across this nation, the local factory can be the lifeblood of the community. And as we know all too well, the closure of a factory devastates the workers, their families, and the entire community,” Brown, D-Ohio, said. “This new tax credit would provide support for new, manufacturing investment in hard-hit communities. It would provide private investors with real incentives to invest in companies that want to breathe new life into shuttered manufacturing facilities and create new jobs.”
Organizations supporting the Manufacturing Communities Investment Act across Ohio include the Youngstown/Warren Regional Chamber and the Western Reserve Port Authority.
The New Markets Tax Credit expired after 2013. From 2003 to 2012, the program drove $60 billion in private investment while creating more than 550,000 private sector job, Brown’s office reported. Nearly 15% of NMTC projects have been in the manufacturing sector, leveraging more than $2.50 in private sector investment for every tax credit dollar, helping the U.S. manufacturing sector add jobs for the first time since the 1990s. Since December 2009, the manufacturing sector has added more than 500,000 jobs to the U.S. economy.
Published by The Business Journal, Youngstown, Ohio.
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