President Donald Trump’s attempt to create U.S. jobs by taxing solar panel imports could backfire.
That’s according to the CEO of the Solar Energy Industries Association trade group, who says it’s domestic workers that will feel the pain.
“We have been the fastest growing form of new energy...and this is putting the brakes on that crazy growth,” Abigail Ross Hopper told Cheddar in an interview. “These are not people who are looking for what nationality the company they work for is. They just want to feed their families and pay their mortgages. And those are the people whose jobs are at risk.”
Earlier this week President Trump signed a law that would impose a 30 percent tariff on imported solar panel and sells, a move the administration says will encourage domestic manufacturing.
But the SEIA says the vast majority of the 260,000 Americans employed in the industry work in peripheral industries like installation. Ross Hopper says the bill will result in 23,000 layoffs this year and delay or cancel billions of dollars of investment in the sector.
She also says it might dissuade U.S. consumers from going green.
“Most [businesses and consumers] want to choose solar because it saves them money,” she said. “This decision changes that calculus.”
For full interview [click here](https://cheddar.com/videos/solar-power-in-america).
The U.S. economy added 136,000 jobs in September, indicating sustained — yet slowing — growth amid increasing concerns of an economic downturn.
These are the headlines you Need 2 Know for Friday, October 4, 2019.
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By midday Wednesday, the Dow had plunged roughly 500 points, before rebounding slightly, while the S&P and Nasdaq Indexes were also down.
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One man was shot in the chest with a live round by police in Hong Kong on Tuesday during widespread and violent protests that coincided with celebrations across China marking 70 years of the Communist state.
The current instability led the Geneva-based organization to cut its forecast for trade volume growth to just 1.2 percent in 2019, an over 50 percent drop from an earlier estimate.
Rep. Carolyn Maloney, the author of the pending Smithsonian Women's History Museum Act, told Cheddar that it's "difficult to empower women, if you don't even recognize them."
From Wall Street to Silicon Valley, these are the top stories that moved markets and had investors, business leaders, and entrepreneurs talking this week on Cheddar.*
The latest tally represents about a 50 percent surge in illnesses and deaths since the CDC last took stock of the damage. As illnesses mount, regulators have stopped short of issuing a ban on vaping, recommending instead vape users abstain from vaping until the cause of the illness is identified.
