GRAND RAPIDS (WZZM)-- Vice President Biden was in Grand Rapids Wednesday to show how a local company is succeeding while keeping manufacturing jobs here at home.
American Seating has been in Grand Rapids for 125 years. It makes seats for schools, courtrooms, buses, and ballparks. Vice President Biden thought the company would be the perfect back drop for his speech on bringing manufacturing jobs back to America.
Before the Vice President took to the podium, he took a tour of the factory and got to see the seats being made. At American Seating, all the products are manufactured in the USA.
American Seating president Tom Bush said, "We really stress innovation and intellectual properties and engineered to order. It's something you don't want to do overseas."
Vice President Biden said, "For example, all of the high tech firms like Sysco, Oracle, and Google -- they're all an important lynchpin in us maintaining a competitive edge in this world. But the sum total they employ is fewer than the jobs lost in the automobile factories in 2008."
The Vice President talked about how the Obama administration was going to bring manufacturing jobs back to America by eliminating incentives to send jobs overseas and by offering tax credits for what Biden calls "insourcing."
"You're going to hear, I promise you, your kids are going to hear about 'insourcing' as much as we did about 'outsourcing'," he said.
American Seating makes 75% of the seats for public transportation in North America. They also make seats at venues like Radio City Music Hall, Fenway Park, Comerica Park and stadiums like the Big House at University of Michigan.
For the workers, the speech wasn't so much political as it was about being recognized for what they do.
"It's not every day a Vice President comes to American Seating, Grand Rapids, or Michigan. It was a great day for everybody," says Bush.
American Seating got its start in 1886 by inventing the first school desk-seat combination. It employs 500 people in the Grand Rapids area.
From the Associated Press