Straits Times (September 18)
On Monday, Donald Trump “effectively broadsided one of the world’s largest trade relationships, announcing plans to proceed with tariffs on another US$200 billion in US imports of Chinese goods.” Combined with previous tariffs, “this means roughly half of everything Americans buy from China…is now subject to punitive import duties. Whole industrial sectors stand to feel the effects, including agriculture, manufacturing, textiles and retail.”
Tags: Agriculture, Broadsided, China, Duties, Import, Imports, Manufacturing, Punitive, Relationships, Retail, Tariffs, Textiles, Trade, Trump, U.S.
Newsweek (March 12)
By playing “his America First card,” President Trump thinks he’s getting ahead, particularly in the Rust Belt. He believes adopting tariffs will help fulfill “his promise to America’s industrial heartland to bring back jobs in its traditional industries. The problem is that those in the industrial heartland don’t seem to think it’s the right thing to do.” In fact, many “who work in manufacturing, remain convinced that tariffs will increase costs and lead to job losses. Far from saving the industrial sector, they say, Trump is showing economic illiteracy that will only add to the cost of significant consumer goods.”
Tags: America first, Consumer goods, Costs, Economic illiteracy, Heartland, Jobs, Manufacturing, Rust Belt, Tariffs, Trump
Newsweek (January 18)
“As 2018 begins, the United States has become the largest producer of gas, oil, and coal in history. Its stock market is at record levels. The economy is growing at a 3 percent rate—and unemployment may dip below 4 percent, even though some commentators have claimed over the last decade that it likely would never fall below 5 percent again. The auto, steel, manufacturing, financial, agricultural, and high-tech industries are ascendant.”
Tags: Coal, Economy, Gas, Manufacturing, Oil, Producer, Stock market, U.S., Unemployment
Bloomberg (December 20)
“Japan has gained a tremendous amount of manufacturing competitiveness. A 2016 study by consulting firm Deloitte ranked Japan the fourth-most competitive country for manufacturing, a huge leap from the No. 10 position it held three years earlier.”
Tags: Competitiveness, Deloitte, Japan, Manufacturing, Rank
Institutional Investor (September 11)
“China’s mobile economy may well power the nation’s growth for decades to come, becoming an engine that will more than make up for the slowdown of the country’s traditional growth engines, such as manufacturing and exports.” That is the main thesis of a recently published book by Winston Wenyan Ma, a managing director at China Investment Corp., the country’s sovereign wealth fund with more than $800 billion in assets.
Tags: China, China Investment Corp., Exports, Growth, Growth engines, M&A, Manufacturing, Mobile economy, Slowdown
Los Angeles Times (August 16)
“America’s top business executives may have bristled over President Trump’s ban on refugees, his withdrawal from the Paris climate accord and his decision to bar transgender Americans from the military.” Still, “it wasn’t until the embattled president all but defended white supremacists in the aftermath of the deadly clashes over the weekend in Charlottesville, Va., that the country’s corporate elite decided they had had enough.”And, “by Wednesday, so many executives had resigned from Trump’s economic advisory and manufacturing councils, including the heads of General Electric Co., Intel Corp. and Campbell Soup Co., that the president announced on Twitter that he was disbanding the panels.”
Tags: Advisory councils, Ban, Business, Campbell Soup, Charlottesville, Clashes, Deadly, Economic, Embattled, Executives, GE, Intel, Manufacturing, Military, Paris accord, Refugees, Transgender, Trump, U.S., White supremacists
Reuters (May 14)
“Desperate to overcome Japan’s growing shortage of labor, mid-sized companies are planning to buy robots and other equipment to automate a wide range of tasks, including manufacturing, earthmoving and hotel room service…. If the investment ambitions are fulfilled it would show there is a silver lining as Japan tries to cope with a shrinking and rapidly aging population. It could help equipment-makers, lift the country’s low productivity and boost economic growth.”
Tags: Aging, Automate, Desperate, Economic growth, Japan, Labor, Manufacturing, Productivity, Robots, Shortage, Silver lining
New York Times (January 9)
India’s “man-made currency crisis” has had real costs and limited benefit. Two months after the surprise move to invalidate over 80% of existing currency, “the manufacturing sector is contracting; real estate and car sales are down; and farm workers, shopkeepers and other Indians report that a shortage of cash has made life increasingly difficult.”
Tags: Benefit, Car sales, Contracting, Costs, Crisis, Currency, Farm workers, India, Manufacturing, Real estate, Shopkeepers, Shortage
Reuters (September 1)
“Activity in China’s manufacturing sector unexpectedly expanded at its fastest pace in nearly two years in August as construction boomed, suggesting the economy is steadying in response to stronger government spending.” The strong performance “may reinforce growing views that China’s central bank will be in no hurry to cut interest rates or banks’ reserve requirements, for fear of adding to high debt levels or fuelling asset bubbles.”
Tags: Asset bubbles, Boom, China, Construction, Debt, Economy, Government, Interest rates, Manufacturing, Pace, Reserves, Spending, Steadying
The Economist (April 16)
“Across the developing world, solar power is hitting its stride.” In 2015, “global solar-energy capacity rose by 26% last year,” with China and India accounting for much of the gain. China displaced Germany in 2015 “to become the biggest producer of solar energy, benefiting from its dominance of solar-panel manufacturing and policies to reduce dependence on dirtier fuels, such as coal.” Not content to be left behind, India is also racing ahead with plans to increase solar installations twentyfold. “KPMG, a consultancy, expects solar’s share of India’s energy mix to rise to 12.5% by 2025.”
Tags: Capacity, China, Coal, Developing world, Energy mix, Germany, India, Manufacturing, Solar power
