CONCURRENT RESOLUTIONS—JUNE 24, 1980
94 STAT. 3669
AMERICAN AUTOMOBILE AND TRUCK INDUSTRYCONGRESSIONAL SUPPORT Whereas, the American automobile and truck industry produces one million seven hundred and fifty thousand jobs, or one out of every twelve manufacturing jobs in the United States and also supports thousands of jobs in other key industries such as steel, rubber, glass, plastics, aluminum, copper, malleable iron, textiles and electronics; and Whereas, the American automobile and truck industry is a major customer for fifty thousand small and medium size businesses located in every State, and a healthy and strong domestic automobile industry is necessary to the livelihood of twenty-seven thousand domestic auto dealers; and Whereas, the domestic automobile manufacturers have undertaken an all-out effort to retool facilities for the production of small, fuel efficient autos and trucks in response to the sudden and unprecedented shift in consumer demand that occurred in 1979; and Whereas, in the spirit of free trade, the United States has provided an open door to automobile and truck imports regardless of domestic content while most other countries including Japan have virtually closed their auto markets to United States produced vehicles tnrough local content requirements, tariffs, or elaborate and indirect taxes; and Whereas, Japanese automobile manufacturers, confronted with slack Japanese demand and tight import restrictions in other countries, have increased overtime and added auto production capacity in Japan in a massive effort to expand auto exports to the United States, raising their market share from 12 per centum in 1978 to over 21 per centum in the first quarter of 1980 with an eventual market target of 30 per centum or greater; and Whereas, the United States incurred an auto trade deficit with Japan of more than $9,000,000,000 in 1979 with estimates that the deficit will exceed $10,000,000,000 in auto and truck trade in 1980, thereby worsening inflation in the United States; and Whereas, the massive unemployment resulting from the decline in United States auto production has imposed major costs on Federal, State, and local governments across the country in the form of trade adjustment assistance, unemployment benefits, social services, and large losses in tax revenues; and Whereas, the present economic difficulty in the American automobile and truck industry results from more than a downturn in the business cycle, is not self-correcting and threatens to inflict lasting structural deterioration and dislocation on the industrial base of the United States: Now, therefore, be it Resolved by the Senate (the House of Representatives concurring). That— (1) it is a goal of the United States to achieve technological superiority in the world automobile and truck industry; and (2) the American automobile and truck industry is a strategic national industry that is essential to the economic stability and national security of the United States; and (3) economic, fiscal, and import policies should be designed to create adequate capital and to produce a climate for the American automobile and truck industry to achieve a rapid conversion of plant capacity to the production of increasingly safe, high
79-194
O—81—pt. 3
65: QL3"
June 24, 1980 [S. Con. Res. 101]
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