Assessing U.S. Manufacturing's Recovery
U.S. manufacturing got walloped during the Great Recession. It lost 20% of its output and 15% of its workforce. "That's second only to the Great Depression of the 1930s, when it lost about half its total output,"says Cliff Waldman,chief economist for the Manufacturers Alliance for Productivity and Innovation (MAPI), a manufacturing leadership organization.
The manufacturing economy bottomed out in mid-2009. But by the end of that year, things were looking up-manufacturing was recovering faster than the rest of the overall economy. "In fact, it was helping to pull the overall economy out of the bottom of the Great Recession," says Waldman.
While the factory sector still hasn't recovered from the Great Recession, says Waldman, being 4% to 5% lower than its pre-recession peak, it is showing some rallying signs. Manufacturing employment was up every month from January to April 2017 (it dipped slightly in May) and output grew 2.7% in the first quarter of 2017.