We must create jobs for youth

Cesar Lumba, Las Vegas

Thursday, June 20, 2013 | 2:03 a.m.

Charles Blow is right on the mark with his assessment that the first decade of the 21st century has been disastrous for America’s youth. Our young are listless, directionless and disconsolate over their prospects for a good, rewarding life.

Nearly every assessment of America’s future shows a country that is second-tier among the mature industrialized countries and that is struggling to compete with the developing countries such as China, India and Brazil.

We have to reward our ambitious and high-achieving youth with good-paying jobs and a good prospect for entering the middle class. How do we do this? We must bring manufacturing back to the U.S. We can’t expect our children to have an upbeat outlook if they know that only Wal-Mart and McDonald’s jobs are waiting for them after they graduate from high school, or a sales clerk’s job at the car rental companies after they graduate from college.

Within five or 10 years, all foreign manufacturers, including American multinationals, who sell their products in the U.S. must start manufacturing in the U.S. The companies that fail to comply will be slapped with huge tariffs on their products.

During President Ronald Reagan’s time, we did this with car manufacturers, and now nearly all major foreign car manufacturers are making cars in the U.S. We must do this in nearly all manufacturing industries.

If our youth know they will do OK financially, many of the social ills that beset our children will tend to solve themselves because the kids will be busy at work, keeping their noses clean and trying to impress their bosses so they can have those lucrative careers.