Officials say Michigan EV industry needs more talent recruitment – 9&10 News

Policymakers tackled Michigan’s expanding electric vehicle sector at Thursday’s Mackinac Policy Conference, discussing the best ways to draw talent to the industry.

The panelists, which included auto industry professionals and a metro Detroit congresswoman, said that school training programs would be essential to get future talent interested in the field.

“The number one supplier is the education system,” said Ann Thompson, manager of workforce development for Ford. “They’re supplying your people.”

Speakers said that manufacturing can prove an attractive career path for students who may not be interested in office jobs.

“When students are in high school, they need to have an opportunity to understand what this looks like,” Thompson said. “And maybe that’s through work-based learning, maybe that’s dual enrollment, maybe that’s CTE.”

Panelists discussed Chinese manufacturers, who are currently leading the global industry. Chinese companies supplied a majority of electric vehicles sold across the globe in 2023.

The federal government has announced future pollution regulations that would require manufacturers to invest in cleaner technology.

The federal government has also enacted tax credits for some electric vehicles, and according to the White House, over $25 billion in investments has been announced for just EV charging infrastructure.

“We’re in competition with China,” said Rep. Haley Stevens, D-Birmingham. “We don’t need to become the Chinese Communist Party. It is going to be American industrial policy that wins the day for us.”

Panelists also said that support for EV advancement could benefit other technological fields.

“We are in an incredible moonshot moment — we’re talking about EV’s, but we also know that this is the net-zero carbon emissions future that our auto industry is setting, and that ties to a bunch of technologies from EV’s to hydrogen and the like,” Stevens said.