One Measure of US Economic Failure

[youbet]

That figure includes corp profits from offshore manufacturing. Nice for CEO bonuses, but hardly a job creator, etc.

 

[brewer12345]

"Another interesting factoid from the BEA data is that corporate profits from manufacturing have increased 867% (6% CAGR) over the past 35 years."

3Yrs, that's pretty funny. Corporate profits doesn't necessarily mean that the sector is healthy in the way most Merkins would think of it. How about employment? Average real wage? How about looking at the last 5 or 10 years, not 35 (conveniently starting in the early 70s when the economy was in the midst of the inflationary spiral)? Take a road trip to Ohio, Indiana, Michigan, etc.

 

[al_bundy]

How are you measuring that?

exports have been growing for decades

 

[MasterBlaster]

"Another interesting factoid from the BEA data is that corporate profits from manufacturing have increased 867% (6% CAGR) over the past 35 years."

Yet another misleading statistic...

Inflation alone as measured by the CPI accounts for over 500 percent of that 867 number.

Normal people would put it something like... Inflation adjusted profits for manufacturing are up around 60 percent since 1970.

That is not as great a headline for the NY times though.

Or are we to conclude...

Those jerk companies are rolling in the dough so we need to take all that money from them. Where's my congressman ! We need justice !

 

[TromboneAl]

With reply #1, this thread topic changed from the USA's account balance to discussions about GDP, etc.

If this thread had been about individuals instead of countries, it would have stayed on the topic of net worth rather than income. If someone said that his net worth was -40K, we wouldn't have said that his income is more important.

Why isn't a country's account balance important?

 

[youbet]

From the Congressional Budget Office......


"The manufacturing sector of the U.S. economy has experienced substantial job losses over the past several years. In January 2004, the number of such jobs stood at 14.3 million, down by 3.0 million jobs, or 17.5 percent, since July 2000 and about 5.2 million since the historical peak in 1979. Employment in manufacturing was its lowest since July 1950 "

I am NOT screaming for protectionism.  But I am saying that there are serious issues regarding the manufacturing sector's health as measured by jobs.

When we talk of the manufacturing sector's profits being up, I think of it like this:  If the forest products industry geared up and clear cut all of our forests (everything, federal lands, state parks, city parks, residential areas, etc.), they would reap high profits.  But would you say the forest products industry is healthy going forward? 

 

[Nords]

I am NOT screaming for protectionism.  But I am saying that there are serious issues regarding the manufacturing sector's health as measured by jobs. 

Robots & CNC mills don't need healthcare or retirement plans.

I'd say the sector is doing fine-- it's the employees who should be keeping their skills updated...

 

[al_bundy]

From the Congressional Budget Office......


"The manufacturing sector of the U.S. economy has experienced substantial job losses over the past several years. In January 2004, the number of such jobs stood at 14.3 million, down by 3.0 million jobs, or 17.5 percent, since July 2000 and about 5.2 million since the historical peak in 1979. Employment in manufacturing was its lowest since July 1950 "

I am NOT screaming for protectionism.  But I am saying that there are serious issues regarding the manufacturing sector's health as measured by jobs. 

When we talk of the manufacturing sector's profits being up, I think of it like this:  If the forest products industry geared up and clear cut all of our forests (everything, federal lands, state parks, city parks, residential areas, etc.), they would reap high profits.  But would you say the forest products industry is healthy going forward? 

that's because companies refuse to become more efficient either through stupidity or because of union rules

expanding manufacturing jobs isn't the key since things are becoming more efficient and like agriculture we need less people to produce stuff. This is the 21st century

 

[slepyhed]

If this thread had been about individuals instead of countries, it would have stayed on the topic of net worth rather than income.   If someone said that his net worth was -40K, we wouldn't have said that his income is more important.

Why isn't a country's account balance important? 

Because countries don't retire, and they can't really "save" for a rainy day the way you and I can. Countries will work until they drop. Add in the fact that countries occasionally employ violence to get their way, and you see that the rules are very much different.

 

[TromboneAl]

Yes, good point.

What about the interest they need to pay on their loans? That could be used for something else.

 

[semtex]

It is a dilemma. To keep the manufacture job, the workers have to compete globally. A Ford assembly worker asks $50/hour. It just doesn’t work. So either outsourcing or import people they would like to accept lower pay.

 

[youbet]

expanding manufacturing jobs isn't the key since things are becoming more efficient and like agriculture we need less people to produce stuff. This is the 21st century

The comparison to agriculture isn't a good one........ With manufacturing it's possible to expand employment and improve efficiency.

Strange. You seem morbidly gleeful over the situation.  While many of our manufacturing companies and labor unions were myopic in their outlook during their good times, I still cheer for those that are suceeding despite it all and am pulling for a revival.  IMHO the revival will come from small entrepreneurs more substantially than from a rebirth of the historical manufacturing powerhouses.

We have the state of the economy and we have the state of society.  Different but overlapping.  Jobs are an important part of that overlap.    

 

[slepyhed]

What about the interest they need to pay on their loans?  That could be used for something else.

For the things that really matter, money and bonds and interrest are not a constraint.

For example, if Iran's nuclear weapons development program is constrained by their ability to enrich uranium, money alone is not going to speed up the process. It would if they could use the money to purchase equipment and manpower on an open market, but there is no such open market. They have to develop their own hardware and skills, and that takes time.

Another example: there's plenty of housing available in the US, enough for everyone (some people have more than one house!). Yet we have homelessness. Lack of resources? No, more of a lack of will. Its not that we can't afford to give free houses to bums, its that the average voting American can't stand to see some loafer get something for nothing.

 

[Scrooge]

With reply #1, this thread topic changed from the USA's account balance to discussions about GDP, etc.

If this thread had been about individuals instead of countries, it would have stayed on the topic of net worth rather than income.   If someone said that his net worth was -40K, we wouldn't have said that his income is more important.

Why isn't a country's account balance important? 

NW and the current account balance are two different things. If this country were to liquidate its assets and pay its debts -- say, we have decided to move to Titan -- we could make quite a bit of money to the tune of $50 trillion, give or take some pocket change. See, for example, US net worth data by the Federal Reserve at http://www.federalreserve.gov/releases/Z1/Current/z1.pdf starting on page 102.

What's the exchange rate on Titan these days anyway

 

[Gone4Good]

3Yrs, that's pretty funny.  Corporate profits doesn't necessarily mean that the sector is healthy in the way most Merkins would think of it.  How about employment?  Average real wage?  How about looking at the last 5 or 10 years, not 35 (conveniently starting in the early 70s when the economy was in the midst of the inflationary spiral)?  Take a road trip to Ohio, Indiana, Michigan, etc.

I certainly wouldn't measure the health of an industry by employment or even market share . . . its profits that are important. You can grow employment and market share right into bankruptcy.

To your second point, I chose 1970 randomly with a vague notion that the 70's were when people started to complain in earnest about foreign competition. However, pre-tax corporate profits are still up 50% since 1995 and 54% since 2000 (1995-2000 was flat to slightly down).

In 2005 corporate profits from manufacturing where higher than at any time in history . . . who here would have guessed that? Have you ever seen that reported anywhere? I guess factory closings make better headlines.

 

[Gone4Good]

Yet another misleading statistic...

Inflation alone as measured by the CPI accounts for over 500 percent of that 867 number.

Normal people would put it something like... Inflation adjusted profits for manufacturing are up around 60 percent since 1970.

That is not as great a headline for the NY times though.

Or are we to conclude...

Those jerk companies are rolling in the dough so we need to take all that money from them. Where's my congressman ! We need justice !

You're absolutely right that manufacturing growth is slow. But the point was that manufacturing is growing and has been growing pretty consistently for decades. Have you ever seen that reported anywhere?? You're right that it isn't a great headline for the NY Times, but not in the way you intended. What makes a better lead story "US manufacturing in decline" or "US manufacturing growing slowly"?

The "Problem" that people keep referencing isn't that manufacturing is declining in absolute terms, but relative to the rest of the economy. In other words, the rest of the economy is growing much more quickly then is manufacturing. As a result manufacturing's share of the economy declines.

Then again, maybe the lead story should be that "US Service Economy Expands Too Quickly" . . . which is another, and more accurate way, of framing the "problem."

 

[youbet]

The "Problem" that people keep referencing isn't that manufacturing is declining in absolute terms, but relative to the rest of the economy.  In other words, the rest of the economy is growing much more quickly then is manufacturing.  As a result manufacturing's share of the economy declines.

You seem confused.  The "problem" people keep referencing is that manufacturing jobs are disappearing and being replaced by dramatically lower paying service sector jobs.  I understand that someone like yourself has absolutely no connection to what the "people" are saying.  But you need to try to understand that the feelings of the American public might be different than that of a finance show "talking head."

We have the state of the economy and we have the state of society. Different but overlapping. Jobs are an important part of that overlap.

 

[Scrooge]

You seem confused.  The "problem" people keep referencing is that manufacturing jobs are disappearing and being replaced by dramatically lower paying service sector jobs.  I understand that someone like yourself has absolutely no connection to what the "people" are saying.  But you need to try to understand that the feelings of the American public might be different than that of a finance show "talking head."

Real median houshold income has been growing for the last 40 years, although it has had its ups and downs. See Figure 1 at http://www.census.gov/prod/2006pubs/p60-231.pdf

 

[astromeria]

Real median houshold income has been growing for the last 40 years

Start a little later (20, 25 years ago) and exclude the top quintile, and it hasn't. Upper income households have been doing great, middle class Americans not.

 

[al_bundy]

You seem confused.  The "problem" people keep referencing is that manufacturing jobs are disappearing and being replaced by dramatically lower paying service sector jobs.  I understand that someone like yourself has absolutely no connection to what the "people" are saying.  But you need to try to understand that the feelings of the American public might be different than that of a finance show "talking head."

We have the state of the economy and we have the state of society.  Different but overlapping.  Jobs are an important part of that overlap.   

i'm happy in my high paying service job that wouldn't exist if manufacturing was still king. A lot of high paying jobs have been created due to manufacturing's decline or stagnation or whatever. NYC got rid of most of its manufacturing and things couldn't be better here. in fact they are turning an old warehouse my dad used to work in into condos right now.

if you are sad that people with no skills can't find a job that paid as well as a former manufacturing job, too bad. The manufacturing jobs now pay market wages. if you want more money you need to go to school or learn some other skill. it's not fair that a lot of manufacturing workers who make more than a lot of people with graduate degrees are complaining they don't get paid more.

 

[Scrooge]

Start a little later (20, 25 years ago) and exclude the top quintile, and it hasn't. Upper income households have been doing great, middle class Americans not.

If you start in 1980-1985, when median income was just under $40k and look at the next 20 years, it has grown to $46.3K today. As far as the quintile distribution goes, all five quintiles have seen their income increase over the last 20 years. See Table A-3 on page 47 of the PDF file linked above: $9.8K to $10.6K, $25.2K to $27.3K, $42.2 to $46.3K, $63.6K to $72.8K and $120.4K to $159.5K, respectively.

However, these stats don't seem to provide us with any ER-useful information. The only thing that I can see as useable is that incomes seem to take longer to rise after a recession these days, which may help those of us who are still working to plan better. But the difference doesn't seem to be pronounced enough to make much of a difference.

 

[Gone4Good]

You seem confused.  The "problem" people keep referencing is that manufacturing jobs are disappearing and being replaced by dramatically lower paying service sector jobs. 

Yup.  You can count me among those with a "dramatically lower paying service sector job."  I guess that is why I won't be retiring until the ripe old age of 38.

I don't think you will find many people who would trade their office jobs to work on an assembly line . . . but I guess that is just what I heard from the "talking heads" 

 

[youbet]

  I guess that is why I won't be retiring until the ripe old age of 38.

Gee, that's impressive!  But what's keeping you from stepping out of the harness sooner?  What obstacles do you need to overcome to achieve FIRE?  Why can't you do it NOW?

 

[Scrooge]

Gee, that's impressive!  But what's keeping you from stepping out of the harness sooner?  What obstacles do you need to overcome to achieve FIRE?  Why can't you do it NOW?

I'll go out on a limb here and volunteer a guess: the answer is "money"!

 

[Gone4Good]

Gee, that's impressive!  But what's keeping you from stepping out of the harness sooner?  What obstacles do you need to overcome to achieve FIRE?  Why can't you do it NOW?

I can. I'm working to fund the $20K annual travel budget.