What are the Benefits of Made in the U.S.A. Safety Products?

After posting the question Is Made In America important anymore? to several Linked In Groups, we now would like to encourage discussion about the benefits (and perceived benefits) for Made In U.S.A. products.  We do want to first address some misconceptions about what a Made In U.S.A. product actually means and list some clear definitions for this loosely distributed term.  So many people define the term Made in the U.S.A. differently.  The concern from the Federal Trade Commission is to make sure labeling is not false or misleading to U.S. consumers.  To get a clearer understanding from a governmental point of view, please see link,
http://business.ftc.gov/documents/bus03-complying-made-usa-standard
 .

As a safety products distributor and broker, we’re having harder times locating Made in U.S.A. industrial safety products for our retail/wholesale business.  At the industrial trade shows we’ve exhibited in or sought out vendor sourcing at, All Safety Products has surveyed and researched manufacturers to find out what percentage of actual American-made products they are sourcing versus sending out to foreign sources.  We try to identify on our website when a safety product is Made in U.S.A. for your convenience but our sourcing is becoming more scarce for actual Made in America safety products.

Oftentimes manufacturer’s and their rep agencies become a little too sensitive when you ask them probing questions about the actual material content made in the U.S.A. versus the actual final assembly, the geographic location of the production plant, and where the final assembly location occurs.

Upon our research conducted, we have found that even a lot of so-called manufacturers are really importers of foreign goods or claim that they have U.S. controlled factories overseas.  How about the whole amount of the product made here in the U.S. (made by U.S. workers at a U.S. plant location, material grown or synthesized in the U.S., etc.)?

Manufacturing today accounts for 12% of the U.S. economy and about 11% of the private-sector workforce, but its significance is even greater than these numbers would suggest.

According to ABC News, almost 10,000 new jobs would be created if each American spent an extra $3.33 a week on Made in the U.S.A. products.

So perhaps another way to phrase the discussion question would be: Does the source of a product influence your buying decision(s)? Why or why not?  We welcome your comments!