Asia's Economic Miracle: Dead and Buried?

[LeveragedBuyout]

Do u refer to Ili Pika about manufacturing?

Not specifically directed at you, but rather, an entire cohort of Chinese users. I can't tell you how many times that chart of manufacturing value added has been posted by Chinese users, but it's been so often that I've almost memorized it. Manufacturing is a small contributor to the US economy, so we don't care about it, and no one else has the manufacturing scale that China has, so no one else can compare. Thus, it's only the Chinese users who keep presenting that chart.

I'm not bitter about it, just bored.

 

[AndrewJin]

Not specifically directed at you, but rather, an entire cohort of Chinese users. I can't tell you how many times that chart of manufacturing value added has been posted by Chinese users, but it's been so often that I've almost memorized it. Manufacturing is a small contributor to the US economy, so we don't care about it, and no one else has the manufacturing scale that China has, so no one else can compare. Thus, it's only the Chinese users who keep presenting that chart.

I'm not bitter about it, just bored.

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Make in US

 

[Transhumanist]

Manufacturing is a small contributor to the US economy, so we don't care about it, and no one else has the manufacturing scale that China has, so no one else can compare.

Manufacturing contributes to about 1/3 of US GDP, right? However, manufacturing industries only account for 12.5% themselves (without influencing other industries). Admittedly I've never really paid attention to the US economy (I don't live in the US, I'm here working on a joint US-Norwegian defense project), so I could be interpreting this wrong.

Manufacturing industries generated $2.1 trillion in GDP (12.5 percent of total U.S. gross domestic product) in 2013. But even these figures do not fully capture manufacturing’s role in the economy. Manufacturing provides a significant source of demand for goods and services in other sectors of the economy, and these sales to other industries are not captured in measures of manufacturing sector GDP but are counted in the broader measure of its gross output. U.S. manufacturing had gross output of $5.9 trillion in 2013, more than one-third (35.4 percent) of U.S. GDP in 2013. Manufacturing is by far the most important sector of the U.S. economy in terms of total output and employment. The manufacturing sector supported approximately 17.1 million indirect jobs in the United States, in addition to the 12.0 million persons directly employed in manufacturing, for a total of 29.1 million jobs directly and indirectly supported, more than one-fifth (21.3 percent) of total U.S. employment in 2013.

This is from: The Manufacturing Footprint and the Importance of U.S. Manufacturing Jobs

I'm not yet able to post links, but the information can be found in the article (the bolded part above) on the website EPI.

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Make in US

That figure will go up, the US is seeing steady improvements to its manufacturing capability and investments from overseas. Even nations like China have been investing in US manufacturing. Manufacturing output is still tepid, but the PMI index for US manufacturing has consistently been reading in the expansion territory (anything over 50.0).

Driven partly by more competitive labor and energy costs and companies' desire to produce goods closer to their customers, the number of factory jobs has started to rise after plunging for decades, edging up by about 600,000 over the past four years to more than 12 million. Some U.S. companies are bringing jobs back home, and foreign businesses are setting up shop. Newspapers are trumpeting investments in American production, and advertisements—such as the nostalgia-drenched Chrysler TV ad shown during the Super Bowl and featuring Bob Dylan—celebrate a resurgent U.S. manufacturing sector.

From: Why U.S. Manufacturing Is Poised for a Comeback (Maybe)

Headwinds are still present though, as noted in this chart from the same article:

US manufacturing still isn't as competitive as low-cost nations overseas. But that dynamic is changing too.

This article can be found at WSJ.

 

[LeveragedBuyout]

Manufacturing industries generated $2.1 trillion in GDP (12.5 percent of total U.S. gross domestic product) in 2013.

Yes, that's the part I was focused on. It's only a third of the size of China's manufacturing as a percent of GDP, even as our economy has been much larger. Offshoring was a conscious plan by US and European companies, but it's yet to be seen if China will do the same (highly doubtful). And the (deserved) pride that Chinese users here demonstrate in their manufacturing prowess would indicate that cultural attitudes in China are not to the point where offshoring would be looked on favorably.

By the time such attitudes might change (if ever), 3-D printing and automation will have rendered the question moot. In any case, my point is that showing China as "victorious" through the lens of manufacturing value added doesn't represent reality very well, since building up China's manufacturing capabilities was part of the West's design.