After four decades selling cars and trucks in the U.S. and nearly two decades producing them here, Japan's auto companies enter the new millennium as a part of the fabric of America. For twenty years Marysville, Ohio; Smyrna, Tennessee; Fremont, California and other cities have been hometowns for JAMA companies and their employees, who take pride in the American cars and trucks they build there. Japanese vehicle manufacturers joined the communities of Princeton, Indiana and Buffalo, West Virginia last year, and began producing trucks and engines in these towns. They will open more new plants in Lincoln, Alabama and Moraine, Ohio in the next few years.
In total, more than 300,000 Americans design, build and sell Japanese-brand vehicles in America. Japanese automakers have invested more than $16 billion in the U.S. since the late 1970s, and today operate 15 manufacturing plants and 37 R&D and design centers across the country. Every state in the Union has added new jobs because of Japanese automaker activity.
U.S. workers in Japanese-American auto plants have produced more than 22 million vehicles over the last two decades. Last year alone, they produced nearly 2.4 million vehicles. Most of these cars and trucks are now driving down American roads, taking people to work and school and to Little League games in thousands of American hometowns. Last year, about 90,000 of these vehicles were sold overseas as U.S. exports.
The JAMA companies have not just become an integral part of the U.S. economy, but they also have found homes here. Their companies and employees live and work here and so, like their neighbors, gladly shoulder their obligations to civic life. JAMA companies support countless 4-H Clubs; Girl Scout and Boy Scout troops; softball, baseball and other sports leagues; senior centers and scholarship funds.
There are countless stories. In West Lafayette, Indiana, hearing-impaired and nonspeaking students are able to get voice output communication aids because of a Subaru-Isuzu Automotive Foundation grant. Mazda Foundation's Save Our American Resources (SOAR) program sponsors one natural or cultural resource assistant in every U.S. state. Mitsubishi Motors U.S.A. Foundation provides grants nationwide to groups that promote the role of women and people of color in the workplace. Toyota sponsors the Toyota Families for Learning Program, in which parents have an opportunity to earn a high school diploma and enhance their parenting skills by attending school with their young children at more than 80 sites in 19 major cities. Nissan North America allows employees to take up to four days a year off work to volunteer in the community. And more than 700 Honda associates in Marysville donate their time to worthy causes through the Honda Hero Volunteer Program.
Finding a home in a community requires not only economic commitment, but much more. It requires caring about the people in the community, and assuming responsibilities in civic life. JAMA members do. They are threads woven into the fabric of America, and this brochure tells their story.
