US Manufacturing

choi

All reports/articles are worth reading. It is useless for me to quote, even extensively, Mr Wessel's analysis, for a picture is worth a thousand words.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_picture_is_worth_a_thousand_words
("It is believed that the modern use of the phrase stems from an article by Fred R. Barnard in the advertising trade journal Printers' Ink, promoting the use of images in advertisements that appeared on the sides of streetcars. The December 8, 1921 issue carries an ad entitled, 'One Look is Worth A Thousand Words.'")

(1) The big picture.

David Wessel, The Factory Floor Has a Ceiling on Job Creation. Wall Street Journal, Jan 12, 2012.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB ... 53261396168708.html

My comment: This article looks back from 1949 to 2011. The graphic has four panels, the second of which states,

"[caption] Despite falling employment [in US manufacturing]. Amercan factories' output us up...
[heading] Output of US factories[;] Year 2005=100"

The text of the article makes clear panel 2 is adjusted for inflation: "Factory output [in 2011], adjusted to remove the effects of changing prices, is still below the 2007 peak [prior to the financial crisis], but 4% higher than it was a decade ago.

(2) American companies--at least those that survive, are innovative.

John Bussey, The Anti-Kodak: How a US Firm Innovates and Thrives. Wall Street Journal, Jan 13, 2012.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB ... 4577157001419477034

Quote:

"Miliken & Co of Spartanburh, SC, arguably should have been crushed by global competition, just like Kodak. Its roots are in the textile industry, a labor-intensive business * * * [But john Fly, a top executiveof Milliken says,] 'They're [Milliken's traditional textile competitors are] out of business. And Militen is having the best economic performance it's ever had.'

"What Milliken did was first try to hold back the flood of cheap imports--a strategy that chewed up management time and ultimately failed. But then it diversified rapidly out of traditional textiles and moved deeply into niche products that built on its knowledge of textiles and specialty chemicals. Andit bore down on scientific research and manufacturing innovation.

"Today, Milliken makes the fabric that reinforces duct tape, the additives that make refrigerator food containers clear and children's art markers washable, the products that make mattresses fire resistant, countertops antimicrobial, and combat gear proctive. * * * Milliken boasts that we come in contact with its many products almost 50 times a day.

"'They were different because of their willingness to change,' says Bill Fischer, Co-author of 'The Idea Hunter' and an expert on innovation, 'And they moved fast.'

Milliken "researchers can use 5% of their time to investigate whatever they like. Proven innovators get 50%. The idea is to let researchers follow their curiosity to a marketable end. And if the boss doesn't like your idea, there are other venues in the organization you can petition--and that have the power to greenlight your project.

My comment: Milliken & Company
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milliken_&_Company
(headquarters Spartanburg, South Carolina; In 1865 Seth Milliken & William Deering founded Deering Milliken Company, a small woolen fabrics jobbing firm in Portland, Maine

() Factoring in productivity, US wages are competitive again.

James R Hagerty and Kate Linebaugh, In US, a Cheaper Labor Pool; Caterpillar, in Canadian lockout, cites Sharply lower costs south of the border. Wall Street Journal, Jan 6. 2012.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB ... 42983208038646.html

(a) Excerpt in the window of print: US manufacturing labor costs per unit [of output] fell 13% from 2000-2010 as productivity gained.

(b) Quote:

"Wage and benefits costs at a Caterpollar rail-equipment plant in LaGrange, Ill, are less than half of those at the company's locomotive-assembly plant in London, Ontario, Caterpillar says.

"US government data for 2010 show that average hourly compensation costs for manufacturing workers, including benefits and social insurance programs, were $34.74 in the US, compared with 5.67 in Canada.

(c) My comment:
(i) Quotation 1 is the current cost advantages of a single plant in US and in Canada each, whereas quotation 2 is about two nations, in 2010.
(ii) La Grange, Illinois
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/La_Grange,_Illinois
(a village in the surburb of Chicago; incorporated in 1879 by Franklin Dwight Cossitt, who named his town in honor of La Grange, Tennessee, where he had been raised as a youth on an uncle's cotton farm)
(iii) London, Ontario
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/London,_Ontario
(situated along the Quebec City – Windsor Corridor; named after London, England)