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Do you have a source for the statement about “the North has remained the industrial powerhouse?” A brief, unscientific look at data from https://www.nam.org/st

Do you have a source for the statement about “the North has remained the industrial powerhouse?” A brief, unscientific look at data from https://www.nam.org/state-manufacturing-data/ https://www.nam.org/state-manufacturing-data/ suggests that northern manufacturing output has been increasing nowhere near as fast as the south, but I’d love to see better data suggesting otherwise

wahern 6y ago
I actually had in mind total GDP--industrial as in industrialized economy, not manufacturing. In terms of GDP per capita Northern states absolutely dominate. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_states_and_territories_of_the_United_States_by_GDP https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_states_and_territories... But even in manufacturing I think they're still ahead. See https://www.epi.org/publication/the-manufacturing-footprint-and-the-importance-of-u-s-manufacturing-jobs/ https://www.epi.org/publication/the-manufacturing-footprint-... Yes, the growth in Southern states is greater. But growth rates don't say much; apropos HN, an upstart can easily enjoy quadruple digit growth rates while the dominate players only see single digit growth, even when there's no reason to doubt their continued dominance. Nonetheless, for manufacturing the story is definitely changing, because of politics (e.g. Japanese car manufacturers and Airbus being incentivized to open plants in the Deep South), because of automation (easier to relocate plants to rural areas), and because there's less cheap labor in the north (possibly a cause, not only a consequence, of changing migration patterns). I couldn't quickly find any links that broke down manufacturing by value-add or by technology--I suspect by that measure Northern states tend to still dominate in manufacturing, the same way the U.S. still does well in upmarket manufacturing viz-a-viz cheaper nations. But that's more of an educated guess; I don't remember ever seeing any data directly on point.

wahern 6y ago

I actually had in mind total GDP--industrial as in industrialized economy, not manufacturing. In terms of GDP per capita Northern states absolutely dominate. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_states_and_territories_of_the_United_States_by_GDP https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_states_and_territories... But even in manufacturing I think they're still ahead. See https://www.epi.org/publication/the-manufacturing-footprint-and-the-importance-of-u-s-manufacturing-jobs/ https://www.epi.org/publication/the-manufacturing-footprint-... Yes, the growth in Southern states is greater. But growth rates don't say much; apropos HN, an upstart can easily enjoy quadruple digit growth rates while the dominate players only see single digit growth, even when there's no reason to doubt their continued dominance. Nonetheless, for manufacturing the story is definitely changing, because of politics (e.g. Japanese car manufacturers and Airbus being incentivized to open plants in the Deep South), because of automation (easier to relocate plants to rural areas), and because there's less cheap labor in the north (possibly a cause, not only a consequence, of changing migration patterns). I couldn't quickly find any links that broke down manufacturing by value-add or by technology--I suspect by that measure Northern states tend to still dominate in manufacturing, the same way the U.S. still does well in upmarket manufacturing viz-a-viz cheaper nations. But that's more of an educated guess; I don't remember ever seeing any data directly on point.