HIGHER EDUCATION The importance of manufacturing to our economic well-being is not a mystery to the manufacturing industry. But how can we get today’s youth to see the value of a manufacturing career? Read more
Too many American companies base decisions about how to source manufacturing largely on narrow financial criteria, never taking into account the potential strategic value of domestic locations. Proposals for plants are treated like any other investment proposal and subjected to strict return hurdles. Tax, regulatory, intellectual property, and political considerations may also figure heavily in the conversation. But executives, viewing manufacturing mainly as a cost center, give short shrift to the impact that outsourcing or offshoring it may have on a company’s capacity to innovate. Indeed, most don’t consider manufacturing to be part of a company’s innovation system at all. Read more
Jay Timmons was preaching to the “manufacturing” choir in GlaxoSmithKline’s sun-drenched lobby at its Navy Yard offices. Read more
Skills Gap – the difference in the skills required on the job and the actual skills possessed by the employees.
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Georgia launched an apprenticeship program as a new tactic to combat a persistent problem. Even as the state struggles with a stubborn jobless rate, there’s a growing demand for highly skilled workers that remains unmet. Read more
Guest post by Monica Gomez
America has always been known as the “land of opportunity.” But opportunity doesn’t knock unless you work hard for it. While tycoons and businessmen may have shaped the oil, steel, and auto industries, the reality is many of them came from humble beginnings, and worked alongside the skilled tradesmen they later employed before amassing their own wealth—a true testament to the power of the American dream. Read more
With American manufacturing on an upward trajectory, what will it take to sustain its momentum? Karen Norheim, Executive Vice President, American Crane & Equipment Corporation and Tracy Tenpenny, Partner, Tailored Label Products (TLP), believe they have a big part of the answer.
Both Ms. Norheim and Mr. Tenpenny say that attracting Millennial (age 18-32) workers to the industry is critical for maintaining progress. They point to recent research that clearly validates their belief. Read more
While the reshoring tide is undeniably rising, the prospect of clothing and apparel manufacturing returning to the United States remains uncertain. Back in the 1960s, about 95% of clothing worn in the U.S.A. was also made here. Today the opposite is true. Can we flip the switch again?
Even so, we’re now manufacturing more and more stuff in the United States. It’s not that manufacturing left the U.S. Instead, the manufacturing jobs did.
