Manufacturing now

The American public has been misled for years on the realities on how our manufacturing sector has evolved; ever focusing on the larger plants that have closed, but ignoring the many small- and mid-sized firms that have grown in their place and added significantly to the versatile impact that these companies make every day.

Many continue to decry that other countries (like China) have surpassed based purely on the price of the goods, but that is not the entire story, yet it remains the only one told, so here goes a different story:

• The most recent data (2014) states that manufacturers contributed $2.09 trillion to the US Economy (12 percent). A figure that has risen steadily since 2009.
• For every $1 dollar spent in manufacturing, another $1.37 is added to the US Economy, which is the highest multiplier-effect of any economic sector.
• Manufacturing supports approx 18 million private-sector jobs. Nine percent of us are directly employed by manufacturing and each manufacturing job supports (at least) four others.
• The average U.S. manufacturing Worker makes $77,506 annually (N.J. = $91,890); whereas the average in all other industries make $62,546.
• U.S. manufacturers are the most-productive in the world, and No. 1 in quality, as well.
• Three quarters of all private-sector R&D in the U.S. is performed by manufacturers.
• Taken alone, manufacturing in the U.S. would be the ninth-largest economy in the world.

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