As the St. Louis region's 2nd largest employer, Boeing Integrated Defense Systems has a huge footprint on our region's economic landscape. Boeing employs 16,000 people here with an average salary of $75,000, making the company a major economic engine in the bi-state area. Boeing has a local payroll of $1.5 billion and an additional $1.49 billion is spent with some 2,000 suppliers in Missouri and Illinois.
All of this is seriously threatened by the U.S. Defense Department budget cuts proposed by Secretary Robert Gates that would cap production of Boeing's F/A-18 Super Hornet fighter jet and the C-17 Globemaster III military cargo plane. Every position in this world-class research, engineering and manufacturing enterprise is responsible for creating many more jobs for our region from machine shops to building contractors to restaurants to dry cleaners to grocery stores to schools to healthcare providers, etc. In short, Boeing affects the very fabric of life for tens of thousands of St. Louis area residents across the 16 counties that straddle the Mississippi at St. Louis.
Given our already tough unemployment picture, the loss of these Boeing jobs would be catastrophic, creating a cascading blow to our region's quality of life that is simply unacceptable.
But it is not just our region that is at stake here. As George Roman, Boeing vice president of government relations and its top regional executive in St. Louis, noted, "These are more than just parochial interests here in St. Louis. This is about maintaining an adequate industrial base and military preparedness."
Boeing is providing our nation with the highest quality products available to the Department of Defense. These products directly protect and support our country's most precious assets, the men and women serving in Armed Forces. They expect and deserve nothing less than the top-quality products Boeing makes, and we can give them no more. |
