1/ American manufacturers pay 3x more to finance equipment than their global competitors. It has nothing to do with pricing or tariffs, it's a regulatory accident from 2008 that no one has bothered to fix until now:
2/ Read the full brief here: denverrayburn.com/equip-america.…
3/ TLDR: A Korean manufacturer finances a $200k CNC machine for $2,013/month. An American manufacturer pays $6,221 for the same machine.
4/ That gap matters. China's manufacturing base wasn't built on national champions — it's tens of thousands of tier 2/3+ SMEs. Supply chain density requires accessible financing. American companies that could create this dynamism currently face the worst terms in the world.
5/ It's a result of banking regulations. Post-2008, equipment leases were classified as a maximum risk — a call even the Fed considers excessive for industrial assets. At a time when America was offshoring, no one pushed back.
6/ For every dollar of capital, a bank could make $50 in regular commercial loans or just $10 in machine leases. Same dollar, five times less business. Big banks left the market. Only high-cost private lenders stayed with 20%+ cost of capital and artificially-short duration.
7/ Fundamentally, leases exist because equipment retains value. Leasing allows you to pay for the depreciation you use, rather than the whole machine. A $200k CNC with a 20-year life is worth $100k after 10 years — your payments should reflect that depreciation curve.
8/ Global manufacturers get 8-12+ year terms that match the asset's actual life. Many American peers get 2-3 year terms with full repayment required, no residual value recognized. Term is everything — it's what drives the payment from $2,013 to $6,221.
9/ The fix requires no new laws, just a clever application of authority that already exists.
10/ EXIM Bank's ability to guarantee residuals can bring risk weights from 100% back to 20% — pre-2008 levels — allowing traditional banks to re-enter with rates and durations that match the actual equipment useful life.
11/ The program generates a surplus for Treasury through FHA-like insurance premiums, requires no new legislation, and can be launched in under 120 days via Executive Order.
12/ The opportunity to rebuild American manufacturing is real and it's now. The tools exist, the authority exists, the math works. The choice to Equip America is ours.
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