U.S. News --- THE OUTLOOK: Signs of Factory Revival Hard to Spot
The idea that American manufacturing is on the cusp of a renaissance is everywhere these days -- except in the hard numbers.</br></br>It's true that industrial production has grown twice as fast as the economy as a whole in this recovery, and manufacturers are adding jobs again. But economists see those gains as too small relative to what was lost in previous years to suggest a full-blown revival. Factories fell so hard, the logic goes, some gains are a given.</br></br>"There's simply no statistical evidence of a broader renaissance at this point," says Daniel Meckstroth, chief economist with the Manufacturers Alliance for Productivity and Innovation, an Arlington, Va., group that represents mostly large U.S. producers.</br></br>Mr. Meckstroth says measures that look deeper inside the sector continue to flash warning signs. Take factory closings. For the past 13 years, the rate factories have been closing has been declining. That's good. The trouble is the rate of openings has been falling even faster. Simply put, America's factories are dying faster than they're being born.</br></br>To be sure, many U.S. manufacturers are doing better than they have in some time. That's visible in hiring. Manufacturers have added more than 500,000 jobs since early 2010, and Monday's report from the Institute for Supply Management is expected to show manufacturers continued expanding in March. But those gains pale compared with the deep hole created during the recession and just before it: U.S. factories lost nearly 5.7 million jobs from 2000 to 2010.