2023 Automotive Insights Symposium Day 2 Welcome Transcript

RICK MATTOON: Good morning, everyone. My name is Rick Mattoon. I'm the vice president and regional executive, here at the Detroit branch of the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago. It's my pleasure to welcome you back for the second day of our 29th Annual Automotive Insights Symposium.

I know we're looking forward to a very exciting second day after what yesterday I thought was an extremely productive day with lots of interesting conversations. Yesterday, we heard everything from forecasts about trends that will be affecting the industry in 2023 and beyond. And then we also talked about the very important topic about EV affordability and whether or not we can increase the penetration of EV to lower income households, which is obviously going to be an important policy issue going forward.

Today, we're going to pivot to two other really important topics. First is the quality of the jobs that are being created in the EV facilities. This takes on a number of different dimensions, everything from, how do these jobs compare to those of traditional incumbent autoworkers working in ice facilities right now? Does EV production lead to a bright future for workers in this space? Or is it going to be diminished opportunities? Additionally, we want to know about, what is going to be the role of unions in helping to form these jobs and be able to protect what this sector looks like?

And we're also going to have an important segment on what the federal government is doing to think about how policies can support this EV labor transition that we're seeing. Second, we're going to turn to an important issue that many people often face, which is the geography of where this industry is going to be located and how it's being influenced by incentives being offered by state governments. At this point, there's an active effort by many states to attract battery facilities, production facilities, and all sorts of related suppliers. And we want to more about what those policies entail going forward.

I also would like to take this opportunity to thank some people. First of all, I really want to thank all of the panelists who have given us their time and their insights throughout this program. This has really been a wonderful group of people. I've learned so much just in the first day. And I'm sure I'm going to learn even more today. So we really want to thank those people for giving us their time and their energy.

Second, as you can probably tell, a program like this literally takes a village to put on. And I want to recognize everybody who's been behind the scenes on this, everything from our production team from the Fed, our partners' big shoulders, which have been doing a lot of the heavy lifting into this, our cafeteria staff, public affairs.

It's really a list that can go on and on of people who have really been instrumental in making this program not only interesting from a in-person perspective, but also using new technology to bring a really enhanced experience to our people who are watching this online right now, so really a big, big round of applause for those folks.

And then, lastly, I really have to single out Kristin Dziczek, my partner here at the bank and one of my most esteemed colleagues. A year ago, we were lucky enough to get Kristin to come to the Chicago Fed after a long and very illustrious career at the Center for Automotive Research.

When Kristin arrived, we gave her two charges. One was very simple, which is, can you design a research agenda for us to understand what an EV transition looks like for industry, for the supply chain, for auto communities, for legacy workers? The list goes on and on. And so that's obviously a very easy lift for her to be able to accomplish that in a year.

But I think what we also have seen is Kristin has brought this energy to this program. The second charge we had was, how can we re-envision what this auto symposium will look like going forward? And the depth of the knowledge that we're developing-- these focus on specific policy issues, is really a testament to all the great work that Kristen has put into this. So, needless to say, we at the Chicago Fed are thrilled that Kristin is here. And we really appreciate everything she's done to make this a really extraordinary program. Yeah.

[APPLAUSE]

OK, now I have a couple of housekeeping things. And then I'll get out of the way, so you can have the more interesting part, which is Kristin, and her special conversation, and her fireside chat with the president of Unifor. If you were here yesterday, Leslie did a great job of explaining what Pigeonhole is. All right? There's a QR code in front of you. If you were not here yesterday, scan that QR code, because that's very important. Because that's how we're going to take questions.

So for people who are both online and those people who are here in the audience, you can submit your questions through the Pigeonhole app. So please take the opportunity to do that right now. It's a really excellent technology. And I think we're pretty excited about using it. So without further ado, well, I will turn the floor over to my colleague, Kristin. And welcome again to the second day of our program.