Since that plan was unveiled, Leader Hoyer and House Democrats have worked to advance legislation addressing those three issues. The most significant legislation yet - the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act – implements a number of the goals laid out in the Make It In America plan. It would create millions of jobs and repair our national infrastructure network to unlock America’s economic potential, and will help millions of American workers build better lives for their families.

Majority Leader Hoyer in 2018: “Education; entrepreneurship; and infrastructure.  In these three areas, Congress needs to step up and act. We need to promote pathways to career opportunities and make training and education more affordable and accessible…we need to unleash our economy and job creation by repairing our aging infrastructure and building the innovative infrastructure of the future. If we can make Congress a partner again in helping businesses and workers get ahead, we can begin to renew Americans’ faith in government as a force for good.” [7/23/18]

The Make It In America plan aims to get hardworking Americans ahead by setting the following targeted goals and policy recommendations:

Infrastructure:

Goals:

• Unleash our economy and job creation by repairing and rebuilding our aging infrastructure
• Build the innovative infrastructure of the future

• Enact multi-year, fully funded authorization bills that tackle the backlog for both transportation networks and water infrastructure
• Build a reliable, efficient, and resilient electrical grid that includes clean energy resources
• Promote a modern energy infrastructure that reduces waste and incentivizes storage and alternative forms of energy for vehicles
• Expand affordable high-speed internet access, including through the accelerated deployment of 5G wireless infrastructure

Goals:

• Promote pathways to career opportunities
• Make training and education accessible and affordable

• Promote stackable credentials for students preparing for the workforce, as well as those already in the workforce taking on new career challenges
• Allow Pell grants to cover training programs

Goals:

• Encourage new entrepreneurs by ensuring access to workplace benefits like health care and retirement security
• Provide more and stronger tools to grow ideas into successful businesses

• Provide a framework that promotes portability of benefits, such as health insurance and retirement
• Increase the availability of capital to smaller firms
• Promote regional industry clusters

THE INFRASTRUCTURE INVESTMENT AND JOBS ACT WILL REPAIR AGING INFRASTRUCTURE AND BUILD THE INFRASTRUCTURE OF THE FUTURE

Enact multi-year, fully funded authorization bills that tackle the backlog for both transportation networks and water infrastructure

• The Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act includes funding to modernize and upgrade our energy system. It upgrades our power infrastructure, including by building thousands of miles of new, resilient transmission lines to facilitate the expansion of renewable energy. 
• The bill creates a new Grid Deployment Authority, invests in research and development for advanced transmission and electricity distribution technologies, and promotes smart grid technologies that deliver flexibility and resilience. 
• The bill invests in demonstration projects and research hubs for next-generation technologies like advanced nuclear reactors, carbon capture, and clean hydrogen.

• The Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act would build electric vehicle charging corridors across the country, helping to accelerate the adoption of electric vehicles.
• The funds will help with the deployment of electric vehicle chargers along highway corridors to facilitate long-distance travel and within communities to provide convenient charging stations where people live, work, and shop. Federal funding will have a particular focus on rural, disadvantaged, and hard-to-reach communities.

• The bill includes a substantial investment in broadband deployment, helping to close the digital divide with a historic level of investment in high-speed Internet to help workers, students, and seniors get online.

BY PROMOTING PATHWAYS TO CAREER OPPORTUNITIES, THE INFRASTRUCTURE INVESTMENT AND JOBS ACT MEETS THE EDUCATION GOALS OF THE MAKE IT IN AMERICA PLAN

Promote pathways to career opportunities

• The Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act:
  • Allows states greater flexibility to address surface transportation workforce development, training and education needs, including activities that address current workforce gaps, such as work on construction projects
  • Permits states to obligate funds for pre-apprenticeships, apprenticeships and career opportunities for on-the-job training and vocational school support. 

• The energy infrastructure portion, and specifically the efficiency and building infrastructure portion, of the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act:
  • Provides grants to institutions of higher education to establish centers to train engineers and other qualified individuals in energy-efficient design and operations and provides funding for the federal cost share of nonprofit partnerships between public employers, industry, and labor for career skills training programs.
  • Invests in institutions of higher education-based centers that provide assessments of small- and medium-sized manufacturers to optimize their energy efficiency and environmental performance and would also promote emerging technologies and R&D for alternative energy sources for energy-intensive industries.