To be a true economic superpower, a country, any country, has to be a country that makes things. The United States is no exception; in the late 19th and 20th centuries, the United States went from a mostly agrarian society to a booming industrial giant, a manufacturing powerhouse that, among other things, helped win two world wars and created a comfortable and prosperous middle class.
We were losing that, but now American manufacturing is returning to America. The factories are coming home, and that’s a good thing. Peter Navarro is the Director of the White House Office of Trade and Manufacturing Policy, and he has the numbers; he also points out the Institute for Supply Management (ISM) report that backs those numbers up.
Today, the White House Office of Trade and Manufacturing Policy, which I direct, released a comprehensive new report and companion video documenting an emerging American manufacturing renaissance.
Almost on cue, the Institute for Supply Management supplied the exclamation point.
The ISM Manufacturing Index jumped a full point in October to 55.5, beating Wall Street expectations of 54.7 and marking the tenth consecutive month American manufacturing has been in expansion territory.
This is not statistical noise. It is Trumpnomics at work.
This turnaround, as Mr. Navarro points out, reverses the trend that occurred when Joe Biden was president. Not that this should come as a surprise to anyone.
The internals are even stronger than the headline. New orders registered 55.5. Production surged to 59.0. Factory employment remained firmly in expansion at 52.4. Inventories rose to 51.4. Every one of the five components that make up the headline ISM index is now signaling expansion. Export orders also rose to 51.2.
For perspective, throughout most of 2023 and 2024, American manufacturing languished in contraction. Factories were closing, supply chains remained offshore, and America continued surrendering strategic industrial capacity.
Now the arrow is pointing sharply in the other direction.
It is indeed. Mr. Navarro points out around 250 new factories being built from the ground up, with over $166 billion invested. Another roughly 270 projects, representing around $220 billion in investment, are being planned to expand, modernize or refurbish and re-open existing plants. Bear in mind all that entails; aside from the eventual manufacturing jobs, every one of these projects represents even more jobs, to meet the demand for endless commodities, products and services — from concrete for foundations to steel for structure to skilled construction workers, electricians, plumbers, glaziers, and more. Some of the more specialized factories, for example the ones that have clean rooms, will have to be qualified and validated, which means still more skilled jobs.
It’s jobs all the way down.
There’s literally nothing to complain about in all this. It’s working, We are, once more, becoming a nation that builds things. We are, once more, becoming a nation that fixes things, that creates, that innovates. We’re also becoming a nation that takes advantage of its own resources, with policies like “drill, baby, drill” and “mine, baby, mine.”
This is good news. It’s news we should hope to see more of. Remember that on Tuesday.
You can view the Office of Trade and Manufacturing Policy report here, and the latest ISM manufacturing report here.
Editor’s Note: Thanks to President Trump’s leadership and bold policies, America’s economy is back on track.
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