CNBC: New study paints bleak picture of manufacturing rebound

A study points to actual weakness in the manufacturing sectors of our economy.

The conclusion flies in the face of widespread evidence that job growth has been healthy since the bottom of the Great Recession of 2007 - 2009.

What this study promotes, however, is more government involvement in manufacturing, which remains our most heavily unionized private economic sector.  

CNBC calls the foundation "nonpartisan." 

That means nothing: this is about promotion of  involving government deeper into big corporate and big labor special interests.

Another way of putting this is government creates a protection racket that favors specific politically connected special interests in the name of "help" and "fairness" and "the sky is falling" assumptions if government doesn't act.   PB

----
From CNBC.com:

One of the most encouraging aspects of the U.S. economic recovery is the halo effect on manufacturing, which accounts for 1 in 6 private-sector jobs.

Yet a new study is dismissing that renaissance as little more than a "myth."

The report by the nonpartisan Information Technology and Innovation Foundation, a Washington-based think tank, asserts that the sector's growth has been fueled in part by free trade advocates and government statistics that mask a sharp decline in manufacturing activity since 2000...

"American manufacturing has still not recovered to 2007 output or employment levels," the study says.

"Moreover, the lion's share of growth that has occurred appears to have been driven by a cyclical, rather than structural, recovery, and as such may represent only a temporary trend."

The report flies in the face of what many analysts consider a broad-based recovery in manufacturing, jump-started in large part by booming U.S. oil and gas production...

The foundation, however, says the recent job gains barely make a dent in what it calls the "unprecedented" decline in U.S. manufacturing since 2000.

The result is a sector still hobbled by high effective corporate tax rates and limited public investment in research, development and job training.

Even with the recent improvement, the study says the U.S. has lost roughly 1 million manufacturing jobs and 15,000 manufacturing establishments since 2000.

Trouble in the sector goes even deeper than that, the study says...

The report accuses free trade advocates of pushing the narrative of a manufacturing rebound despite the evidence to the contrary.

"They fear that an accurate portrayal of U.S. manufacturing will result not in a robust U.S. manufacturing strategy but in trade protectionism," the authors write.

As a result, the report warns that policymakers and business leaders are being lulled into complacency...
----
Link: http://www.cnbc.com/id/102327907