Why Trump will find it hard to make American economy greater
Even if Trump could return factory production to its heyday by toughening trade deals and threatening to slap tariffs on America's trading partners, a surge of new jobs wouldn't necessarily follow.
Many analysts say the economy needs better and more widely available post-high school education and training, whether through community colleges, vocational schools or boot camps offering technology training.
Last year, the Obama administration opened some financial aid programs to Flatiron and other boot camps.
Modern manufacturing work increasingly requires high-tech know-how requiring some education or training beyond high school.
Since the economic recovery began in 2009, only 12 percent of manufacturing jobs have gone to workers with no more than a high school degree, according to research by Georgetown University's Center for Education and the Workforce.
He favors expanded tax breaks for companies that invest in new machinery and equipment, which typically make workers more productive.
Douglas Holtz-Eakin, president of the conservative American Action Forum, says Trump's push to loosen regulations might also lead to more startup companies, which could prod established businesses to become more efficient.
[...] many economists, like Robert Gordon of Northwestern University, argue that today's innovations — in mobile communications and biotechnology, for example — aren't transformative enough to fuel the explosive productivity growth that resulted from inventions like the automobile, telephone and computer.
Trump's nominee for Treasury secretary, Steven Mnuchin, noted this concern at a confirmation hearing last week: "The average American worker has gotten nowhere," he said.
The tepid gains for low- and middle-income families have slowed the economy because those groups typically spend more of their income than do affluent households, and consumer spending is the economy's primary fuel.
Mnuchin said the a