No Pay Raises For The "Top 25"

No pay raises for  the “top 25” executives of the two remaining companies that received “exceptional” Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP) assistance, General Motors and Ally Financial, formerly GMAC.
The Acting Special Master for TARP Executive Compensation, Patricia Geoghegan, issued that ruling April 26, 2013.

According to a statement that was issued to explain that ruling:

“The cash compensation for the top 25 executives at the two companies has not increased from 2012 levels.  Moreover, for 2013, cash salaries for the top 25 executives at the two companies as a group are on average four percent below the median for cash salaries and 56 percent below the median for total cash compensation for similar positions at similar companies. 

Compensation continues to be predominantly in stock and therefore performance-based:  All but one of the pay packages approved in 2013 contain a majority of stock compensation (rather than cash).  Transferability of the stock remains subject to deferral generally over a period of three years, and hedging of the stock compensation remains prohibited.  Bonuses are subject to clawback if they were based on materially inaccurate financial statements or other materially inaccurate performance metrics.
OSM continues to limit total direct compensation:
GM’s average pay packages for its top 25 employees for 2013 do not exceed the 50th percentile compared to similar positions at similar companies.
Ally Financial’s average pay packages for its top 25 employees for 2013 are mid-way between the 50th and the 75th percentiles compared to similar positions at similar companies.”

GM and Ally have been paying back TARP money. The statement released April 26 also shows that General Motors has repayed approximately $30 billion of the nearly $50 billion that was invested in GM.
Treasury Department officials said in December 2012 that the U.S. should be out of the GM offices within the next 12-15 months
Ally Financial has paid back about one-third of the U.S. government’s $17.2 billion investment in TARP money.

Restore The Roar: Manufacturing Renaissance: A five-part ebook essay series that begins with story of the U.S. auto industry’s Great Collapse, details its recovery and tells the story of entrepreneurs who are driving new manufacturing clusters in Michigan.

Restore The Roar: Manufacturing Renaissance is available through Amazon and Vook.com.

Last Chance Mile: The Reinvention of an American Community. How could Grand Rapids, Michigan transform itself from a lunch-bucket, Rust Belt community into a home for Nobel Price

winners, while Detroit was falling apart less than three hours away?

Last Chance Mile: The Reinvention of an American Community tells that story and is available through Amazon, Abbott Press, Barnes & Noble and the iBookstore. Autographed hardcover and softcover editions are available by clicking here.

Last Chance Mile: The Reinvention of an American Community is also available at Schuler Books & Music on 28th Street and West Coast Coffee on Monroe Center in Grand Rapids, Michigan.

Chrysler's Investing: This Time In Ohio

Chrysler Group Plans to Invest Nearly $20 Million in Toledo Machining Plant

AUBURN HILLS, Mich., April 26, 2013 /PRNewswire/ -- 

• Investment to increase capacity for production of torque converters for new generation, fuel-efficient nine-speed transmission
• Company's total investment in U.S. facilities over $5.2 billion since June 2009  

Chrysler Group LLC announced today that it will invest $19.6 million in its Toledo Machining Plant inPerrysburg, Ohio, to increase capacity of the torque converter it's machining for the nine-speed transmission. With this announcement, the Company's total investments in its U.S. operations since June 2009 increase to over $5.2 billion.

The new torque converters will be paired with the next generation, fuel efficient nine-speed front-wheel drive transmission being assembled at Chrysler Group's Indiana (Kokomo, Ind.) Transmission Plant I. The new transmission will debut in the 2014 Jeep® Cherokee.

"The new nine-speed transmission is a critical part of our strategy to meet fuel economy requirements over the next several years and Toledo Machining will play an integral role in bringing this transmission to market," saidScott Garberding, Senior Vice President, Manufacturing, Chrysler Group LLC. "Securing this additional investment is a testament to the dedication and commitment of the plant's workforce and helps secure its future long-term."

The investment will fund the installation of new equipment and tooling for additional machining and assembly capacity. Installation is expected to begin in the third quarter of 2014 and will be completed by the end of 2014.

In August 2011, a $72 million investment in Toledo Machining was announced to modernize the plant to produce the eight- and nine-speed torque converters on two new production lines and a new steering column for the Dodge Dart and Jeep Cherokee. These installations will be complete in the third quarter this year.

In February, the Company announced that it was investing $374 million in several of its Kokomo, Ind., facilities, including establishing a new manufacturing site in Tipton, Ind., to increase production capacity of the nine-speed transmission.

Toledo Machining currently produces torque converters for Kokomo Transmission (Ind.), Indiana Transmission I and II (Kokomo, Ind.), Sterling Heights Assembly (Mich.), and Toluca (Mex.).

The plant also produces steering columns for the following assembly plants: Warren Truck (Mich.), Belvidere (Ill.), Sterling Heights (Mich.), Toledo Assembly Complex (Ohio); Windsor (Ont.), Toluca (Mex.), Saltillo (Mex.), Arab American Vehicles (Egypt) and Carabobo (Venezuela).

~ LCP ~

Restore The Roar: Manufacturing Renaissance, a five-part ebook essay series beginning with The Great Collapse, is now available through Amazon and Vook.com.

Other essays in the series include: Quenching The Thirst, the story of the rise of the craft brewing industry in Michigan; Farm To Fork, the story of food processing in Michigan; Outrage in Michigan, the story of the Right To Work legislative battle; and Where Are The Workers, the story of the struggle to convince young workers to make a career out of manufacturing.

Last Chance Mile: The Reinvention of an American Community tells the story

of Grand Rapids, Michigan and how a $1 billion donation from Jay Van Andel started the reinvention of this American community.

Order your autographed hardcover or softcover edition of Last Chance Mile by clicking here.

Ebook editions are available through Abbott Press and Amazon.

Manufacturing Jobs Growing in Michigan: Factory Help Wanted

Manufacturing employment increased in Michigan by 14,648 jobs in 2012 according to Manufacturers News Incorporated, a rise of 2.3 percent despite the loss of 54 manufacturing companies.


This momentum is expected to continue in the months ahead. Chrysler plans a $240 million expansion of its Detroit plants; Ford will invest $773 million to expand hiring at six factories across the state; and GM plans to expand its Lansing facility. 

That is pushing employment at several auto suppliers, including Detroit Manufacturing Systems, which opened an auto parts plant in Detroit and will supply Ford with instrument panels. Brose North America opened a new facility in New Boston; auto parts maker Faurecia opened a new plant in Fraser; and Magna E-Car Systems established a new assembly plant in Grand Blanc Township. 


“Michigan’s industrial climate continues to improve,” said Tom Dubin, president of the Evanston, IL-based publishing company, which has been surveying industry since 1912. “ The state’s efforts to reduce business costs have resulted in many companies reinvesting in its manufacturing sector.”


Grand Rapids is the number-one city for manufacturing employment in Michigan.
Manufacturers News Incorporated reported April 22, 2013, that 41,715 people were working in manufacturing jobs in Grand Rapids in 2012, an increase of 5.8 percent over 2011.
Detroit was in second place with 31,772 manufacturing jobs, no significant change from the previous year.

While Grand Rapids has the most manufacturing employment by city in the MNI survey, Southeast Michigan still leads the state on a regional basis, with 378,278 people bringing home paychecks from manufacturing businesses.

Southwest Michigan, a region that includes Grand Rapids, had manufacturing employment of 204,651 in 2012.

This is good news of course. But it also presented a challenge in 2012 for many manufacturers, who struggled to fill open positions in their factories and engineering labs.

Here’s an excerpt from Where Are The Workers? the second installment in a five-part ebook essay series, Restore The Roar: Manufacturing Renaissance.


Manufacturing is on its way back led by the automotive industry. However, the case is also being made that manufacturing isn’t ready for the revival, especially the suppliers who are chained up to the OEMs.
Are enough new warriors being recruited to this fight? Here’s the story of a real warrior, a man who saw actual combat. Now he is facing a new and in some ways more difficult challenge.
Bryan Heath survived Marine Corps boot camp and three tours of duty in Iraq and Afghanistan, but never realized how tough it would be to find a job in the civilian world.
After knocking his head against the employment wall with job after job that went nowhere, Heath was doing his internship on the shop floor at Commercial Tool & Die Inc. (CTD) when I met him near Grand Rapids, Mich., while he continued taking classes across the street at Expert Tech LLC, a sister company of CTD, part of the Commercial Tool Group family of companies. Expert Tech was set up to find that missing generation who for one reason or another has decided that factory life is not for them.
 “Learning this trade is something I will be able to use for the rest of my life,” Heath said. “This was the perfect opportunity to step in and say ‘this is who I am.’”
Kind of like what he did in boot camp? Bryan looked me in the eye and said, “Yes sir.”
Commercial Tool & Die opened Expert Tech, to help itself and its competitors, as well as people like Bryan Heath. It’s an effort to deal with an industrial crisis born of the rebirth of manufacturing in West Michigan. Business is booming. The demand is there after a decade that was lost to the industrial sector. Now the problem is finding people trained in the skill sets that are needed.
“The community colleges have pulled back, the voc-tech schools are not as prevalent as they used to be. There just isn’t the infrastructure there used to be support skill and knowledge development in our trade,” Commercial Tool and Die President Todd Finley said.
Quite simply, the talent pool is nearly drained and could become a barely damp puddle.
 “We have really gutted our educational pipeline for skilled manufacturing,” Expert Tech President Ryan Pohl explained. “There is no feeder pipeline for people coming in with basic skills.”
Filling that pool company by company could be an insurmountable challenge because although it is something every shop should be doing, let’s be honest; some are so small that they are running as fast as they can just to stay in place. There’s no money and no time to put together anything close to an in-house training program
That is why CDT formed Expert Tech. “Give me someone who will show up every day and work hard,” said Pohl, “and we will train them for a company or I will train someone for free, betting I can find work for them.”

~ LCP ~

Where Are The Workers?  is one essay in a five-part ebook series, Restore The Roar: Manufacturing Renaissance, now available through Amazon and Vook.com.

See the World Today in your Chevrolet

Chevrolet Posts 10th Straight Quarter of Record Global Sales

2013-04-16

• GM first quarter sales up 3.6 percent on strength of new product launches
• Cruze sales top 2 million around the world since launch in 2009

DETROIT – Chevrolet sold more than 1.18 million vehicles around the world in the first quarter of 2013 achieving its 10th consecutive quarter of record global sales on the strength of products like the Cruze compact car which recently surpassed the 2 million mark in total global sales since its launch in 2009.

General Motors Co. posted sales of more than 2.36 million in the first quarter of 2013, an increase of 3.6 percent, outpacing the industry which was up 1.5 percent, compared with the same period in 2012.

“ Chevrolet is growing around the world by leveraging GM’s global engineering and design expertise to deliver the right products in the right markets,” said Mark Reuss, GM president of North America. “And because a product like the Cruze has been developed for different markets with a wide variety of consumer needs, we have the flexibility to offer more performance and capability options – like the Cruze Clean Turbo Diesel model that will be launching in the U.S. later this year.”

Guided by a new global vision, ‘Find New Roads,’ rooted in the brand’s legacy of ingenuity, Chevrolet is in the midst of its most aggressive new product rollout with 25 new or significantly redesigned products being launched globally including the all-new Corvette Stingray , Silverado and Impala in the United States and the Spin , Trax , Orlando and Colorado in several major markets around the world.

In the first quarter, Chevrolet U.S. sales totaled more than 469,000, up nearly 5 percent. Sales of the updated Traverse were up 22 percent for the quarter, and helped to boost GM’s total share of the U.S. crossover market 2.5 points.

Other markets posting sales increases include Brazil with sales of 141,000 up more than 3 percent primarily on the strength of the Onix, which accounted for nearly 24 percent of first quarter sales; China with sales of 165,000, up 2.5 percent; and Thailand with sales of 17,000, up 14 percent.

~ LCP ~

Restore The Roar: Manufacturing Renaissance “Where Are The Workers”

The collapse of manufacturing in the last decade of the twentieth century and the slow crawl back up in the twenty-first century have soured many of the Baby Boomers’ children on a life in manufacturing. 

Now that factories are coming back to life, manufacturers are racing to find CNC machinists, assembly line workers, and engineers. In “Where Are The Workers” we will go to West Michigan to find out what manufacturers are doing to bring skilled workers into their factories.

For your copy of Where Are the Workers, the second book in the Restore The Roar ebook essay series, click here.

U.S. Manufacturers Optimistic, 80 Percent Predict Growth

U.S. industrial manufacturers remain positive regarding the outlook for the U.S. economy in the year ahead, while sentiment pertaining to the world economy remains guarded, according to the Q1 2013 Manufacturing Barometer, released April 16, 2013 by PwC US.  According to PwC's survey, 55 percent of respondents expressed optimism about the 12-month outlook for the U.S. economy during the first quarter of 2013, up seven points from the fourth quarter, and only five percent were pessimistic.

"Overall sentiment regarding the direction of the domestic economy remained upbeat among U.S. industrial manufacturers in the first quarter," said Bobby Bono, U.S. industrial manufacturing leader for PwC.  "However, management teams are taking a more conservative approach to forecasting top line performance for the year ahead, given the moderate recovery underway and uncertainty pertaining to fiscal policy."

Reflecting the sustained level of optimism, 78 percent of respondents forecast revenue growth at their own companies for the next 12 months, while only five percent expect negative results.  

The projected average revenue growth rate in the year ahead also dropped to 4.3 percent in the first quarter of 2013, from 5.2 percent in the fourth quarter of 2012.  

Still, attitudes pertaining to the outlook for the U.S. continue to contrast with sentiment regarding the international markets, where optimism toward the 12-month outlook was relatively low at 36 percent, with 45 percent expressing uncertainty.

In addition, the projected contribution of international sales to total revenue over the next 12 months declined to 32 percent, as compared to 38 percent in the fourth quarter of 2012.

Forty-three percent of U.S. industrial manufacturers said they were planning major new investments of capital over the next 12 months, off four points from the fourth quarter of 2012 and below a year ago (53 percent).  

Plans for operational spending also slowed in the first quarter survey, with 71 percent of respondents planning increases over the next 12 months, a nine point reduction from the fourth quarter of 2012.  

Areas where operational spending is expected to increase included research and development, up 14 points to a high of 52 percent, followed by new product or service introductions (38 percent), and information technology (28 percent).  Conversely, investment plans for geographic expansion hit a low of 10 percent, off 18 points from the fourth quarter of 2012.

Plans for M&A activity over the next 12 months dropped to 19 percent in the first quarter survey, off 16 points from the fourth quarter of 2012.  In addition, plans for expansion to new markets abroad decreased 14 points to nine percent, indicating a significant slowdown in investments in international markets.  "Overseas expansion plans have fallen off notably during the past four quarters, with the first quarter survey showing a 26-point reduction from last year," said Bono. "It is clear that companies are keeping their cash closer to home and are waiting for clarity on the world stage before making decisions on investing internationally."

New hiring plans over the next 12 months were reported by 45 percent of industrial manufacturers, off 13 points from 58 percent in the fourth quarter of 2012. Still, overall composite workforce projections rose from 0.5 percent in the fourth quarter 

to 1.0 percent in the first quarter, as a few industrial manufacturers are planning to add large numbers of new employees over the next 12 months.  

~ LCP ~

Restore The Roar: Manufacturing Renaissance a five-part ebook essay series is now available at Vook.com and Amazon.

Part One: The Great Collapse

Manufacturing is Michigan. Michigan is manufacturing. The collapse of its manufacturing sector crippled Michigan for two decades. However, there is opportunity in the carnage. Michigan is coming back.

Restore The Roar: Manufacturing Renaissance: For immediate download, click here.

~ LCP ~

Last Chance Mile: The Reinvention of an American Community shows how the people of Grand Rapids are changing the way the world sees their community and how the community sees itself.

To receive your signed hardcover or softcover edition of Last Chance Mile click on the Add to Cart button, or Buy Now button, if you are on a mobile device, at www.rodkackley.com.

Last Chance Mile: The Reinvention of an American Community is also available at West Coast Coffee on Monroe Center and Schuler Books & Music on 28th Street in Grand Rapids and can be ordered from your favorite bookseller.

Ford, GM Continue Transmission Partnership

 For the third time in the past decade, Ford Motor Company and General Motors Corporation have signed an agreement under which both companies will jointly develop an all-new generation of advanced-technology nine- and 10-speed automatic transmissions for cars, crossovers, SUVs and trucks.

The new transmissions, to be built in both front- and rear-wheel-drive variants, will improve vehicle performance and increase fuel economy.


The collaboration enables both automakers to design, develop, engineer, test, validate and deliver these new transmissions for their vehicles faster and at lower cost than if each company worked independently.

“Engineering teams from GM and Ford have already started initial design work on these new transmissions,” said Jim Lanzon, GM vice president of global transmission engineering. “We expect these new transmissions to raise the standard of technology, performance and quality for our customers while helping drive fuel economy improvements into both companies’ future product portfolios.”

These collaborative efforts have enabled both companies together to deliver more than eight-million durable, high-quality six-speed front-wheel-drive transmissions to customers around the globe.

Ford installs these six-speed transmissions in some of America’s favorite vehicles, such as the Ford Fusion family sedan, the Ford Edge crossover and Ford Escape and Explorer SUVs, while GM installs them into a variety of high-volume, award-winning products such as the Chevrolet Malibu, Chevrolet Traverse, Chevrolet Equinox and Chevrolet Cruze.

That original collaboration served as a template for the new one. As before, each company will manufacture its own transmissions in its own plants with many common components.

“The goal is to keep hardware identical in the Ford and GM transmissions. This will maximize parts commonality and give both companies economy of scale,” said Craig Renneker, Ford’s chief engineer for transmission and driveline component and pre-program engineering. “However, we will each use our own control softwareto ensure that each transmission is carefully matched to the individual brand-specific vehicle DNA for each company.”

~ LCP ~

Manufacturing in Michigan is back. Restore The Roar: Manufacturing Renaissance, a five-part series of ebook essays, documents the fall and rise of Detroit's Big Three along with the creation of new industries that you might not of thought were part of the manufacturing chain.

Restore The Roar: Manufacturing Renaissance, an ebook essay series, is available for immediate download by clicking here.

First All-Electric Sports Car To Be Built In Motor City

Detroit Electric SP:01

DETROIT-- Emissions-free motoring has a new high-performance champion following the unveiling of Detroit Electric's SP:01, a limited-edition, two-seat pure-electric sports car that sets new standards for performance and handling in the electric vehicle (EV) segment.  Boasting an impressive 155mph (249km/h) top speed and covering the 0-62mph (0-100km/h) sprint in a blistering 3.7 seconds, the SP:01 is the world's fastest pure-electric production car.

The new SP:01 was launched under the brand's mantra of 'Pure Electric Excitement' at Detroit Electric's new headquarters in the Fisher Building in downtown Detroit.  Just 999 examples will be built at the company's new production facility in Wayne County, Michigan.

The 37kWh battery gives the SP:01 an impressive range of almost 190 miles, when tested to the New European Driving Cycle (NEDC) standard.  Detroit Electric's home charging unit will enable drivers to fully recharge their SP:01 in 4.3 hours.

"The SP:01 will be exclusive, luxurious and technologically advanced," said Albert Lam, Detroit Electric's Chairman and Group CEO.  "The car will be an exciting and innovative product, displaying outstanding performance coupled with strong green credentials, and delivering an exhilarating driving experience."

The bespoke bodywork is constructed of carbon fibre.  Styled by Detroit Electric's Head of Design, Jerry Chung, the SP:01's angular lines give the car a bold, imposing design while optimising aerodynamic efficiency.

SP:01 is the first car to use innovative smartphone applications to manage the in-car infotainment system.  The Smartphone Application Managed Infotainment system ('SAMI') provides access to a wide range of functions and vehicle systems information.

The SP:01 is equipped with bi-directional charge and discharge capability, made possible through Detroit Electric's patented home charging and power back-up unit, named '360 Powerback'.  As well as charging the battery the unit can also detect power failures in the grid and restore power to the home via SAMI.

An all-disc braking system, anti-lock braking and Electronic Stability Control are fitted as standard, but it is the SP:01's Regenerative Braking technology that sets the car apart, delivering superb stopping performance while ensuring greater energy efficiency.  The car's energy recovery mechanism uses the motor as a generator, recovering kinetic energy and using it to recharge the batteries.

On sale by end of August, the SP:01 will herald a new family of all-electric production cars from Detroit Electric, including two high-performance models that will be in production by the end of 2014.

The price of SP:01 starts at $135,000 USD, and will vary according to specification and local taxes. Each SP:01 will come with a three-year, 30,000-mile warranty with an optional extension for the battery to five years and 50,000 miles.

The original electric car innovators, Detroit Electric began life in 1906 and went on to make some 13,000 vehicles by 1939, setting the EV production world record for the twentieth century.

~ LCP ~

Restore The Roar: Manufacturing Renaissance

Quenching The Thirst

Craft brewers have formed a new community in Michigan that is creating jobs and new tax revenue.

This tight circle of entrepreneurs are also finding a way to reuse some of Michigan’s iconic factory buildings and manufacturing campuses.
Read their stories in Quenching The Thirst, one of five ebook essays in the Restore The Roar: Manufacturing Renaissance series


To look inside this ebook essay and the rest of the series, click here.

GM Invests $322 Million for New Fuel-Efficient Powertrains

DETROIT – General Motors Co. will invest nearly $332 million in four manufacturing sites to produce more fuel-efficient engines and transmissions, demonstrating GM's commitment to deliver what customers want: technology-driven performance and fewer trips to the pump.

The investments – announced today at GM plants in Flint and Bay City, Mich.; Toledo, Ohio, and Bedford, Ind. – will support production of a new Ecotec small gas engine, a new V6 engine, 8-speed transmission, and tooling for an existing 6-speed transmission.

GM also is increasing previously announced powertrain investment in plants in Romulus and Saginaw, Mich., to $646 million – an increase of $46 million – to support production of the new V6 engine.

Since 2009, GM has announced nearly $1.8 billion of investments for the six Powertrain facilities.

“We are investing in technologies and manufacturing capabilities that produce high-quality, fuel-efficient vehicles and components for our customers,” said Diana Tremblay, vice president of GM North American Manufacturing.  “Today’s announcement demonstrates GM’s commitment to growing the business and strengthening the plant communities where we receive so much support.”

Combined, the two investments will retain about 1,650 jobs at the six facilities.

“The selection of these plants and the opportunity for the United Auto Workers to build the next generation of engines and transmissions reflects the great efforts of our work force,” said UAW Vice President Joe Ashton, who directs the union’s GM department. “This investment goes a long way to ensuring GM remains a marketplace leader and our members can continue to support and share in the company’s growth.”

GM’s newly announced $331.8 million investment includes:

• $215 million in Flint Engine Operations for a new small Ecotec gasoline engine, which is part of a new family of engines that includes 3- and 4-cylinder variants with displacements ranging from 1.0 to 1.5 liters. Details of what variants the plant will build will be announced later. The plant will also upgrade tooling for its current V6 engine. 
• $55.7 million in Toledo Transmission Operations for increased capacity and tooling to produce an all-new, advanced 8-speed automatic transmission and an existing 6-speed transmission. The Toledo-based 8-speed will be used in numerous GM vehicles by the end of 2016.
• $31.7 million in Bay City Powertrain including $19.2 million to produce components for a new V6 engine and $12.5 million to produce components for the small Ecotec gasoline engine.
• $29.4 million in Bedford Castings including $19 million to produce components for the small gas engine and $10.4 million to produce components for the new 8-speed and existing 6-speed transmissions.

The additional $46 million brings the total to $646 million for the V6 project including: 

• A $41 million increase to $256 million for Saginaw Metal Castings Operations to produce castings for the new V6 engine. 
• A $5 million increase to $390 million for Romulus Engine Operations to build the new V6 engines. 

The new small Ecotec gasoline engine is part of a global engine family that could top 2 million engines a year by the end of the decade, based on production in Flint and other locations around the world. The new engines will offer improved fuel economy, higher quality, better performance and reduced carbon dioxide emissions.

The 8-speed automatic transmission will assist in improved fuel economy and performance. Details about the new V6 engine program will be announced later.

Since 2009, GM has announced investments of more than $8.5 billion in its U.S. operations - $1.2 billion so far in 2013 – creating or retaining more than 24,700 jobs.

~ LCP ~

The collapse of manufacturing in the last decade of the twentieth century and the slow crawl

back up in the twenty-first century have soured many of the Baby Boomers’ children on a life in manufacturing. 

Now that factories are coming back to life, manufacturers are racing to find CNC machinists, assembly line workers, and engineers. In Where Are The Workers we will go to West Michigan to find out what manufacturers are doing to bring skilled workers into their factories.

For your copy of Where Are the Workers, the second ebook essay in the Restore The Roar: Manufacturing Renaissance series, click here.

Renaissance or Not? Is the Manufacturing Comeback For Real?

The good news is Fitch Ratings has upgraded Michigan’s credit rating to ‘AA” because, among other considerations including conservative spending in state government, manufacturers in the state are doing much better.
The bad news from Fitch is that Michigan’s economy is still “dominated by manufacturing, notably in the cyclical automotive-related sectors.”


The Fitch report that was released April 2, 2013 provides a dramatic snapshot of how rough the first nine years of the twenty-first century were for Michigan.
It shows Michigan lost jobs every year from 2001through 2010. The drop in 2009 was especially bad. Seven percent of Michigan’s jobs were lost that year. Fitch blames the “combined impact” of the U.S. recession, the collapse of the U.S. auto industry and the restructuring of the Detroit Three.


More people in Michigan found work in 2011 and 2012. Employment growth was 2.3 percent and 1.8 percent respectively, above the national rate.
However, the authors of the Fitch report also believe the job losses in the automotive sector — that includes the supply chain as well as Ford, General Motors and Chrysler — will be tough to overcome.


Most of those jobs are not coming back. Just as every job gained in Michigan has a positive ripple effect in the economy. The reverse is true. The ricochet can be deadly.


Personal income growth was miserable in Michigan, compared to the rest of the nation. Yet, it rebounded 5.6 percent in 2011 and 3.5 percent in 2012.


This is especially shocking: two-thirds of auto manufacturing and parts supply jobs disappeared from 2001 through 2010. Some of those jobs have come back. Employment was up 11.2 percent and 3.8 percent, year-over-year, respectively in 2011 and 2012.


However the bad news again is that Michigan’s economy is still tied so tightly to auto manufacturing. That sector accounted for 13.6 percent of Michigan jobs as of February 2013.


Only 8.9 percent of U.S. jobs are in auto manufacturing.


What Fitch described as the “cyclicality” of manufacturing has to be a concern. Goldman  Sachs’ Jan Hatzius said in late March 2013 that the recent resurgence of the U.S. auto industry is more a result of global economic cycles than a true renaissance of made in America Manufacturing.


While he does believe U.S. manufacturing will continue to outperform the rest of the American economy, Hatzius also wrote, “The reason for this will be the broad economic improvement that benefits all sectors...not a structural U.S. manufacturing renaissance.”

~LCP~

Renaissance or not, manufacturing in Michigan is doing better than it has in years and that is rebounding through the economy as the Fitch Report showed.
For more on manufacturing's comeback, check out the Restore The Roar: Manufacturing Renaissance of ebook essays and meet the people leading the recovery.

Restore The Roar: Manufacturing Renaissance, a ebook essay series is available through Amazon and Vook.com

~LCP~

Last Chance Mile: The Reinvention of an American Community tells the story of how the people of Grand Rapids, Michigan shook off their industrial rust and changed the way the world sees their community.

Last Chance Mile: The Reinvention of an American Community is available through Amazon, Abbott Press, or by clicking the Add To Cart button on the Welcome Page of www.rodkackley.com