This Saturday, the United States of America celebrates 250 years of doing business as an independent country. And while the U.S. conducts business with other countries, it also frequently does business with itself. So today, let’s talk about the government’s push to buy American.
Just buy American
Last month, the President of the United States wrote on his social media site that “ALL FEDERAL AGENCIES MUST BUY AMERICAN — NO EXCUSES!” Of course, Congress has already long restricted government agencies from purchasing foreign products through laws, such as the Buy American Act of 1933, that make the preference for domestic products clear. However, agencies are able to get exemption waivers if there is an “unreasonable cost, product unavailability and if domestic preference would be inconsistent with the public interest.” The current administration has argued that too many waivers are granted and has aggressively established policies to push companies to manufacture domestically, even when the current infrastructure can’t yet support such a drastic shift.
For example, earlier this year, the Department of Transportation proposed that “all EV chargers deployed using federal funds should be manufactured using 100% domestic content,” a drastic increase from the current 55% requirement. If the policy is established, it would be the first domestic industry with a 100% requirement. A coalition of 20 states that oppose the proposal argues that the requirement is an attempt by the administration to disrupt the funding of EV infrastructure and that such a requirement would “cause supply chain disruptions, increase costs and cede market share to international competitors.”
No, seriously, buy American.
While the current administration has its own tactics for pushing American products, it isn’t the first to attempt to steer federal funding directly to American companies. Most recently, President Biden signed the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (IIJA) in 2021 which included the Build America, Buy America (BABA) Act. Funds from the BABA Act could not be distributed to infrastructure and transportation projects unless “all of the iron, steel, manufactured products, and construction materials used in the project are produced in the United States.” Of course, just like the 1933 Act, waivers are available for projects where the quality or needed quantity of materials is unavailable domestically or if the cost of domestic materials would increase the project cost by more than 25%. Additionally, a waiver can be applied if the domestic requirement for the project is “inconsistent with the public interest,” such as added delays for projects that need to be completed right away for safety reasons.
Very recently, U.S. Senators Tammy Baldwin (D-Wis.) and Jim Banks (R-Ind.) introduced new legislation to strengthen the enforcement of the 2021 BABA Act after an audit found that the Federal Aviation Administration failed to properly include or enforce BABA-related clauses in projects funded through the IIJA. The senators believe too many agencies are resorting to waivers to avoid fully complying with BABA and want to require agencies to show that they are actively making steps to comply with the legislation and working toward projects that are All-American. As one of the senators said in a statement, “To me, this is straightforward: When we use American tax dollars, we should be investing those dollars back into American workers, products, and businesses.”
Buy American… please?
While it’s a great marketing line, the reality is that buying solely American-made products isn’t something that can simply happen overnight, and even many American consumers are waning on the Buy American Movement.
A survey of 3,000 U.S. consumers’ attitudes toward domestic products among widespread tariffs and inflation last summer found that customers are “putting value and affordability over loyalty to domestic manufacturing” and that domestic loyalty fell the greatest among people 55 and over, from 69% in 2022 to 47% in 2025. The author of the report noted that, “as price concerns intensify, many US consumers appear to associate ‘made in’ labels with elevated prices due to generally higher domestic production costs as well as tariffs on foreign-made goods.”
Critics of Buy America laws argue that they are counterproductive to their stated goals as they often drive up costs and lower the quality of projects. One economist argued that the U.S. needs to “stop fixating on manufacturing jobs as a driver for growth, and should focus more on universal benefits and embrace international expansion and competition.” He believes that the current “fetishization of manufacturing” and nostalgic longing for a by-gone era “enables manufacturing companies to feel they are “too big to fail,” which leads to higher costs and lower wages for American workers. As an Axios reporter put it, the bottom line is that “the costs are borne across the country, while the benefits are concentrated among a small group of businesses.”
