This piece was originally published in the March 2016 issue of ei, the magazine of the electroindustry. By Donald R. Leavens, PhD, Vice President and Chief Economist, NEMA/BIS For much of this decade, renewable energy investment has struggled to gain a foothold, as utilities facing declining electricity demand and revenue growth have turned to abundant, reliable, and lower-cost natural gas to add capacity and…
Why is Congress finding it difficult to pass legislation that helps U.S. business export to developing countries, supports U.S. jobs, and sends money to the U.S. Treasury? The subject is the U.S. Export-Import Bank, which for eight decades has helped U.S. exporters “get paid” but which may be in its last days due to a persistent echo-chamber of falsehoods and…
U.S. electroindustry companies sell billions of dollars of equipment outside the U.S. each year. These companies employ many thousands of workers here in the U.S., workers whose employment depends on the ability of their company “teams” to innovate, make sales, and satisfy their customers. With most of the world’s people (95 percent) and supporting infrastructure outside the U.S., it makes…
This morning at a House of Representatives committee hearing, a major U.S. manufacturer and exporter testifed that the country's transportation and port infrastructure is inadequate to meet its needs to get its products to overseas customers. What solution is the company using to stay competitive in the global marketplace? Ship their products from Canadian ports. How is this possible (on many levels)? Let's take…
It has become almost an accepted truth that the U.S. is no longer a major global player when it comes to manufacturing activity. Well guess what: this represents more rumor than fact as Mark Perry illustrates in an op-ed appearing in today’s Wall Street Journal. While the U.S. economy has certainly experienced a great deal of structural change over the…
As I have said in previous posts, one single data point should not be used to draw firm conclusions about underlying trends in the U.S. economy. But, oh what a disappointment today’s employment report was. According to the BLS, total nonfarm payrolls did increase on net by 39,000 during November, but this gain was significantly below consensus expectations of 145,000;…
After several months of less-than-stellar readings on the U.S. economy, including last week’s lackluster print on Q3 GDP, a few positive data points released this week offer at least some hope for optimism going forward. Both the ISM manufacturing and non-manufacturing indexes registered gains compared to the previous month and some of the key components of each index (new orders,…
Consumers have been fairly cautious with their wallets throughout the economic recovery. It has been hard to blame them, too, given the lackluster pace of improvement for the labor market as well as the significant overhang of debt still plaguing many consumers. Indeed, households have had little cause for celebration thus far and few incentives to ratchet up their spending…
Another month, another disappointing employment report. According to the BLS, ex-census payrolls declined on net by 18,000 during September (and the prior two months were also revised downward) and the unemployment rate continued to hold at a stubbornly-high level of 9.6 percent. In the past year, the economy has added 334,000 payrolls—an average of less than 30K per month—and total…
Today’s release of August home sales data reveals what is essentially a market bouncing along the bottom. Over the last two months sales have remained only slightly below the all-time low that was set back in May 2010 in the immediate aftermath of the federal homebuyer tax credit’s expiry. In addition to weak sales, homes are staying available on the market for…