'Made in USA' standard will mean what it says

WASHINGTON, D.C. -- In reaction to widespread public and political pressure, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) reversed itself and dropped its plan to lower the standard for use of the "Made in USA" label.

The commission refused to ease the requirement to allow goods with significant foreign content to carry the label. The existing standard requires "all or virtually all" of a product's content be made in America to merit the label.

"The FTC's decision to keep the 'Made in USA' label simple, honest and all-American is a tremendous victory for consumers and for American working men and women to proudly make their products here in the U.S.A," said David Flory, a spokesman for the Made In USA Coalition, a consortium of labor, consumer, business and agricultural groups opposing the FTC plan.

A bill opposing the FTC action was introduced in the U.S. House by bipartisan sponsors and gained 226 co-sponsors. A companion bill in the Senate was co-sponsored by a quarter of of the senators.

This rare level of bipartisan unanimity over a trade standard proposal was nurtured by lobbying from more than 100 groups affiliated with the USA coalition, Flory said. "The members of the coalition did an outstanding job of alerting the American people and their representatives to the danger that this proposal represented to American consumers and U.S. jobs," he added.