Hanes Body Creations

Immelt-led panel forms job strategy

The chairman of President Obama’s jobs and competitiveness council said Wednesday there is no magic potion to jobs creation, but the panel is devising pragmatic plans to put people back to work.

General Electric Co. Chairman and CEO Jeffrey Immelt spoke Wednesday with employees during a visit to his company’s gas turbine plant in Greenville, S.C., which employs 3,300 people including 1,700 engineers.

Immelt said his four months on the Obama advisory panel has taught him that even his company can be held accountable for where it creates jobs. He says the panel is working on devising a hundred different business plans for every sector of the economy, with practical steps to help create jobs.

“It’s very unlikely the jobs council’s going to find something that will be a magic potion to create jobs,” he said. But he indicated there are things that can be done. For example, he said, America suffers from a shortage of engineers.

He said the panel has asked all Fortune 500 companies to double their hiring of engineers over the coming year, but that the two dozen business leaders in the group believe even more can be done to educate, train and hire engineers.

Toyota takes steps to bolster production

Toyota’s president said the car maker plans to take 100 percent ownership of two auto-assembly companies it partly owns and combine one of them with two other subsidiaries in an effort to strengthen Japanese manufacturing.

Toyota Motor Corp. President Akio Toyoda said the moves are aimed at keeping auto production in Japan and will quicken product development so it can remain globally competitive.

Under the plan, Toyota Auto Body Co. and Kanto Auto Works, which make Toyota vehicles, will become wholly owned subsidiaries of Toyota by January. Toyota currently owns 56 percent of Toyota Auto Body and 50 percent of Kanto.

Import prices drop for 1st time in a year

Prices of imported goods dropped in June for the first time in a year as oil and food expenses retreated.

The 0.5 percent fall in the import-price index followed a revised 0.1 percent gain in May, Labor Department figures showed Wednesday in Washington. Economists projected a 0.6 percent decrease for June, according to the median estimate in a Bloomberg News survey. Prices excluding petroleum fell 0.2 percent, the first decline since July 2010.

Falling costs will benefit companies like Nike and Hanes – brands that are dealing with more expensive inputs eating into margins.

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