Timmons Breaks Down AI, Upskilling, Taxes and More on “Manufacturing Matters”
Artificial intelligence, upskilling, the economy and more—a recent “Manufacturing Matters” podcast episode featuring NAM President and CEO Jay Timmons touched on a wide array of topics relevant to manufacturing today.
The AI revolution: Recorded at the recent Schneider Electric Innovation Summit 2025 in Las Vegas, the episode featured TECH B2B Marketing’s podcast hosts Winn Hardin and Jimmy Carroll interviewing Timmons on some of the top issues facing manufacturers, starting with AI and disruption.
- “AI is being infused into the operations and the decision-making of manufacturers to really enhance our ability to be more productive and produce more for the whole world,” Timmons said.
- Like the Industrial Revolution and the internet, “AI will be disruptive. I think that’s the one thing that we know.”
- It’s incumbent upon both policymakers and manufacturers “to make sure that disruption is good for society, it’s good for our country, it’s good for promoting our values. And technology is agnostic when it comes to systems of government or values or ethics.”
- Manufacturers must also future-proof jobs involving new technologies, Timmons said. “[Y]our team is your family. … We have a responsibility to make sure that our team has the skills that they need.”
Workforce: On the topic of teams, Timmons brought up manufacturing’s persistent employee shortage.
- “[F]rankly, we have a problem with workforce development,” he said. “We’ve got 400,000 open jobs in the sector today. That grows to 2 million by the year 2033. And that’s before any success comes from the president’s focus on growing manufacturing.”
A speed pass: Referencing the NAM’s U.S. Manufacturing Investment Accelerator Program , Timmons underscored that manufacturers don’t just identify challenges—they bring solutions:
- “The National Association of Manufacturers produced a plan called the Manufacturing Investment Accelerator Program, which says if you have to import something, a critical input [for a] manufacturing facility here in the United States, you get a speed pass to make that item duty-free,” he said.
- “Because the truth is, if you turn on every machine here in the United States, as good as we are, you can only produce about 84% of the critical inputs necessary to build a new manufacturing operation. So think critical minerals, think specialized machines, those types of things. At least 16% will have to be imported.”
A competitive tax system: The pro-manufacturing tax provisions made permanent in H.R. 1 “are really going to help us with investment,” Timmons went on.
- “There is no successful economy in the world that does not have a strong manufacturing base. You know, every dollar that’s invested in manufacturing is another $1.80 of spin-off economic activity. Every job created in manufacturing is another four to five jobs created in other sectors. So manufacturing is the base of all success and the base for improving quality of life for the citizens of whatever country that is.”