Donald Trump’s job creation claims aren’t necessarily as overinflated as is his involvement, says NBC News.
“Companies eager to avoid becoming the target of the next attack by President-elect Donald Trump are preemptively — or retroactively — announcing U.S. job creation plans,” NBC found. “But peel back a layer and the promises come with some caveats. A company’s plan to increase capital expenditures, which include jobs and facility improvements, are typically years in the making. Some of these ‘announcements’ are old news in a new hat.”
Corporations repackaging U.S. job creating “announcements” include: GM, which promised 1,500 jobs; Wal-Mart, which promised 10,000; and Bayer, who says a proposed merger with Monsanto would keep 9,000 and add 3,000 domestic jobs.
“This is the normal course of business,” Maryann Keller, an independent auto industry consultant, told Bloomberg. “All they’re doing is announcing investments that they would have made anyway.”
“Pretty much everybody is dreading being the subject of a tweet,” Kristin Dziczek, a spokeswoman for the Center for Automotive Research, told The Guardian. “Getting hauled out into the court of public opinion with virtually no warning is not something anybody wants to get engaged with.”
Corporations learned quickly how to appease Trump without actually enacting any real changes to their business practices. Early last month, details of his deal with Carrier revealed discrepancies between the number of U.S. jobs Trump promised to save and the actual number that Vice President-elect Mike Pence negotiated with parent company United Technologies to save in exchange for generous tax benefits.
For his part, the president-elect lashed out against NBC on his Twitter:
Totally biased @NBCNews went out of its way to say that the big announcement from Ford, G.M., Lockheed & others that jobs are coming back…
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 18, 2017
to the U.S., but had nothing to do with TRUMP, is more FAKE NEWS. Ask top CEO's of those companies for real facts. Came back because of me!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 18, 2017
No wonder the Today Show on biased @NBC is doing so badly compared to its glorious past. Little credibility!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 18, 2017
