In Tuesday's State of the Union address (link opens transcript), President Obama listed the U.S. government's highest economic priority as "making America a magnet for new jobs and manufacturing."
Referencing the sector's decade-long decline, the president noted that manufacturers have added around 500,000 jobs in the past three years. Obama cited Caterpillar's (CAT 1.59%) and Ford's (F -1.92%) decisions to move jobs back from Japan and Mexico, respectively. He also nodded to U.S. technology companies Intel (INTC -9.20%) and Apple (AAPL -0.35%) for their recent decisions to manufacture some of their chips and computers domestically.
Looking ahead, the president lauded 3-D printing as an emerging business opportunity for America. Referencing a government initiative from August 2012, Obama noted that a "once-shuttered warehouse is now a state-of-the-art lab where new workers are mastering the 3-D printing that has the potential to revolutionize the way we make almost everything."
Obama concluded his remarks by announcing the launch of three additional high-tech manufacturing hubs, with a request to Congress for 11 additional centers to "guarantee that the next revolution in manufacturing is made in America."
