Open Access. Powered by Scholars. Published by Universities.®
Articles 1 - 5 of 5
Full-Text Articles in Entire DC Network
The Long-Run Impacts Of Public Industrial Investment On Local Development And Economic Mobility: Evidence From World War Ii, Andrew Garin, Jonathan Rothbaum
The Long-Run Impacts Of Public Industrial Investment On Local Development And Economic Mobility: Evidence From World War Ii, Andrew Garin, Jonathan Rothbaum
Upjohn Institute Working Papers
This paper studies the long-run effects of government-led construction of manufacturing plants on the regions where they were built and on individuals from those regions. Specifically, we examine publicly financed plants built in dispersed locations outside of major urban centers for security reasons during the United States’ industrial mobilization for World War II. Wartime plant construction had large and persistent impacts on local development, characterized by an expansion of relatively high-wage manufacturing employment throughout the postwar era. These benefits were shared by incumbent residents; we find men born before WWII in counties where plants were built earned $1,200 (in 2020 …
Understanding The Decline Of U.S. Manufacturing Employment, Susan N. Houseman
Understanding The Decline Of U.S. Manufacturing Employment, Susan N. Houseman
Upjohn Institute Working Papers
U.S. manufacturing experienced a precipitous and historically unprecedented decline in employment in the 2000s. Many economists and other analysts—pointing to decades of statistics showing that manufacturing real (inflation-adjusted) output growth has largely kept pace with private sector real output growth, that productivity growth has been much higher, and that the sector’s share of aggregate employment has been declining—argue that manufacturing’s job losses are largely the result of productivity growth (assumed to reflect automation) and are part of a long-term trend. Since the 1980s, however, the apparently robust growth in manufacturing real output and productivity have been driven by a relatively …
Measuring Manufacturing: How The Computer And Semiconductor Industries Affect The Numbers And Perceptions, Susan N. Houseman, Timothy J. Bartik, Timothy Sturgeon
Measuring Manufacturing: How The Computer And Semiconductor Industries Affect The Numbers And Perceptions, Susan N. Houseman, Timothy J. Bartik, Timothy Sturgeon
Upjohn Institute Working Papers
Growth in U.S. manufacturing’s real value-added has exceeded that of aggregate GDP, except during recessions, leading many to conclude that the sector is healthy and that the 30 percent decline in manufacturing employment since 2000 is largely the consequence of automation. The robust growth in real manufacturing GDP, however, is driven by one industry segment: computers and electronic products. In most of manufacturing, real GDP growth has been weak or negative and productivity growth modest. The extraordinary real GDP growth in computer-related industries reflects prices for computers and semiconductors that, when adjusted for product quality improvements, are falling rapidly. Productivity …
Outsourcing, Offshoring, And Productivity Measurement In U.S. Manufacturing, Susan N. Houseman
Outsourcing, Offshoring, And Productivity Measurement In U.S. Manufacturing, Susan N. Houseman
Upjohn Institute Working Papers
I discuss reasons why manufacturing productivity statistics should be interpreted with caution in light of the recent growth of domestic and foreign outsourcing and offshoring. First, outsourcing and offshoring are poorly measured in U.S. statistics, and poor measurement may impart a significant bias to manufacturing and, where offshoring is involved, aggregate productivity statistics. Second, companies often outsource or offshore work to take advantage of cheap (relative to their output) labor, and such cost savings are counted as productivity gains, even in multifactor productivity calculations. This fact has potentially important implications for the interpretation of productivity statistics. Whether, for instance, productivity …
Manufacturers' Outsourcing To Employment Services, Matthew Dey, Susan N. Houseman, Anne E. Polivka
Manufacturers' Outsourcing To Employment Services, Matthew Dey, Susan N. Houseman, Anne E. Polivka
Upjohn Institute Working Papers
We estimate the effects of manufacturers' use of employment services—comprised primarily of temporary help and professional employer organizations—on measured employment and labor productivity in manufacturing between 1989 and 2004. A major contribution of the paper is the construction of panel data on employment by occupation and industry from the Occupational Employment Statistics program. We use these data to document the dramatic rise of production and other manual occupations within the employment services sector and, in conjunction with information from the Contingent Worker Supplements, to estimate the number of employment services workers assigned to manufacturing over the period. Although measured employment …