ABSTRACT
Dan DiMicco, the former CEO of U.S. steelmaker Nucor, served as a trade advisor to the Trump campaign in 2016 and was considered for the position of U.S. Trade Representative in the Trump administration. His 2015 book American Made: Why Making Things Will Return Us to Greatness presaged many of the neomercantilist arguments that Trump would espouse on the campaign trail. Echoing the productivist philosophy of Alexander Hamilton and Friedrich List, DiMicco states, “A country that doesn’t create or make or build things is a country doomed to mediocrity. Manufacturing, and the innovation that comes with it, is indispensable to the vitality of a great nation.”2 He recommends spending at least $3 trillion to rebuild U.S. infrastructure, which will create jobs and revive the middle class. He envisions funding coming from taxes and a national infrastructure bank capitalized by public funds, hedge funds, pension funds, and sovereign wealth funds.3
