Congressman From California Wants to Tax Billionaires to Reboot US Manufacturing

Rep. Ro Khanna, whose district includes Silicon Valley, is calling for higher taxes to train workers for tech jobs.

Rep. Ro Khanna speaks at a rally in Washington on July 20, 2021. Shannon Finney/Getty Images for Green New Deal Network

Two weeks after President Donald Trump declared a national emergency to re-shore American manufacturing, Rep. Ro Khanna (D-Calif.) delivered a speech in Cleveland on April 14 that described his plan to restart U.S. manufacturing by raising taxes on Silicon Valley.

Khanna, who represents California’s 17th district, spoke to the City Club of Cleveland to explain his policy vision for higher taxes on his wealthy Silicon Valley constituents, describing himself as “the guy who represents more billionaires than any person in the world.”

“It’s time to turn the tables. It’s time to put Silicon Valley in the service of America, not America in the service of Silicon Valley,” he remarked to applause.

Amid joblessness, disaffection of working-class voters in the Midwest has been a major story in American politics since 2016, when their support propelled then-candidate Trump to the presidency. Khanna, in Cleveland, offered an alternative to Trump’s chief economic policy of higher tariffs, claiming that the government could invest in training America’s working class for new high-tech jobs in Rust Belt districts, all without requiring a college degree.

“Let’s have 100,000 new digital trades in digital marketing and data management, in learning how to apply AI,” Khanna said, implying that laid-off manual workers could be retrained for these jobs.

“I’m working with Open AI ... to set up tech academies ... across the Midwest,” he noted, adding that they could “provide a $5,000 scholarship for [a] kid’s 18-month credential, [and] they end up with up to a six-figure job” that is based in the area.

Khanna also championed other ideas to boost economic activity. “We need a White House Economic Development Council that will focus on economic growth in every region,” Khanna said, akin to the “boards of trade” run by many states and municipalities to attract investment.

“We should have modern empowerment zones ... allowing businesses that hire locally to get tax-free loans and tax incentives to hire,” he noted. A similar proposal known as “opportunity zones“ was included in the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act signed into law by Trump in 2017.

Khanna also pushed for a slew of progressive policy priorities. He called for universal child care that costs no more than $10 per day, universal health care that frees businesses from paying for their employees’ health insurance plans, and the need for more funding for education. He said raising taxes on billionaires, specifically his constituents, would pay for these plans.

“If we were to get rid of the tax giveaways for the billionaires and the very rich, and at the same rates that we had in the 1990s—the time of high economic growth in this country—we would raise $5 trillion just by doing that,” Khanna said. The highest rate of annual economic growth in the period from 1990 to 1999 was 4.8 percent, according to Statista. Currently, the growth rate is 3.1 percent, according to the Treasury Department.

So far, during the 119th Congress, Khanna has not introduced legislation pertaining to these subjects. Khanna did not immediately respond to a request for comment.