(Picture credit Mike McDonnell)
America’s 250th anniversary has provided us all with an opportunity to celebrate and honor the brave men and women who have fought to defend our nation’s freedom. Thanks to their courage and commitment, generations of Americans have had the chance to work hard, build businesses, raise families, and pursue the American Dream.
Preserving these ideals doesn’t just mean fighting on the battlefield in times of war; it also means fighting for policy decisions that protect our way of life and the American jobs that sustain it. For that reason, I am urging the Trump Administration to impose tariffs on beer imported from Mexico.
Imports of beer into the United States have risen dramatically in recent decades. Nearly 25 percent of our U.S. beer market is imported, up from 14 percent in 2013. Mexico is responsible for a vast majority, more than 80 percent of these imports. This number is not driven by shifting tastes or trends in the beer industry. It represents a steady erosion of our domestic brewing capacity by foreign competition, a story that is all too familiar to so many other American industries.
The simple fact of the matter is that American breweries are at a steep disadvantage compared to those in Mexico. This is not the fault of domestic beer manufacturers, but rather represents the economic differences built into our two economies.
Mexican brewery workers are paid a mere $3,700 per year, wages that would be unthinkably low in the United States. American union brewery workers, on the other hand, earn family-sustaining wages of nearly $80,000 per year. This is not even to mention the tax and regulatory burden shouldered by American beer companies large and small. There is no amount of efficiency or streamlining domestic beermakers can accomplish that will make up for these structural economic differences.
In Nebraska, we have every reason to care about fair trade policies when it comes to manufacturing, particularly in food and beverage related industries. Manufacturing is one of our state’s largest economic engines, employing more than 104,000 Nebraskans and contributing an estimated $21.6 billion to our economy.
Food manufacturing is our largest manufacturing subsector, accounting for nearly 40 percent of all manufacturing employment in the state. These are real jobs, with production workers earning an average of $48,500 a year. They are tied to industries that depend on domestic supply chains and domestic demand. When foreign competitors undercut American manufacturers, the damage cascades across the farms that supply the raw materials, the trucks that deliver the product, and the families who depend on that paycheck.
Organized labor has been unambiguous on this issue. Nine national and local unions, including the Teamsters, the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, the United Steelworkers, and the Machinists, have formally called on the Trump administration to impose tariffs on Mexican beer imports.
This is not a partisan position.
It is the labor movement saying, with one voice, that American workers deserve a fair shot, and that trade policy must be part of how we deliver it. Unions have spent a century fighting for the wages, benefits, and working conditions that define the American middle class. Those of us who are passionate about labor issues recognize the current crisis in the domestic brewing industry as the latest opportunity to fight on behalf of workers.
During my time in the Nebraska Legislature, and in my role as President of the Omaha Federation of Labor, AFL-CIO, I have witnessed firsthand the impact of trade policy on the workers in our state. Our brewery workers, farmers, delivery drivers, and warehouse workers need us to stand in solidarity with them on this issue. Otherwise, the beer industry will become yet another sad tale of a once-proud American craft lost to foreign outsourcing.
I urge the Trump Administration to impose tariffs on imported Mexican beer to level the playing field and keep the American Dream alive for the working men and women of Nebraska and every state in this union.
— Mike McDonnell is President of the Omaha Federation of Labor, AFL-CIO. He previously served in the Nebraska Legislature, representing south Omaha, and retired from the Omaha Fire Department as Fire Chief.