Wisconsin Senator Ron Johnson says his state has 'enough jobs' in response to a local manufacturer's plan to hire 1,000 workers in South Carolina to build postal trucks

• A contract to make 165,000 new postal trucks will add 1,000 jobs for a Wisconsin-based manufacturer.
• Oshkosh Defense has indicated it will add those jobs to a new plant in South Carolina.

It appears that Wisconsin has accomplished something that most US states could only dream of: it has too many jobs.

Wisconsin apparently has so many jobs, that one of its own US senators, Ron Johnson, is content to let South Carolina have 1,000 of them from an Oshkosh-based manufacturer.

"Obviously I am always supportive of manufacturing here in Wisconsin, but at the same time, I recognize that manufacturers have different capabilities elsewhere,"Johnson told local media, regarding Oshkosh Defense's decision to produce 165,000 new US Postal Service trucks at a new facility in Spartanburg, South Carolina.

When the decision was announced back in June, Oshkosh Defense's president John Bryant said that the company was unable to find a building in Wisconsin that was "viable for this project."

The company is repurposing a warehouse to accommodate large-scale manufacturing.

In a statement to the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, Johnson's Democratic counterpart, Senator Tammy Baldwin, said: "To me, it's simple — I want Oshkosh Defense to manufacture trucks in Oshkosh with Wisconsin workers."

"It's not like we don't have enough jobs here in Wisconsin," Johnson said. "The biggest problem we have in Wisconsin right now is employers not being able to find enough workers."

"If it's more efficient, more effective, to spend those [federal dollars] in another state, I don't have a real problem with that," he added.

Johnson blamed Democratic leadership for "programs that are paying people and allowing them to stay on the sidelines," though numerous studies have shown that federal pandemic aid did not keep workers out of the labor force.

He also cited a June survey from Wisconsin's Chamber of Commerce that found nearly nine out of 10 employers were struggling to hire workers. Wisconsin's minimum wage is $7.25 per hour — the lowest allowed under federal law.