Macroeconomic Conditions
Things are not moving up in Europe’s economic tables.
Income and employment continue to sag amid languishing business sentiment, unfinished recovery of the financial sector, and continued political malaise. The euro area’s GDP will finish 2013 down about ½ percent on the year before. The ECB’s...
The current state of the U.S. labor market is generating a significant conversation about the availability of skilled talent especially in light of the manufacturing renaissance underway. The creation and implementation of a sustainable pipeline of talent is integral to both human capital and...
In this audiovisual presentation, Senior Economist Don Norman reviews the most recent manufacturing data. The manufacturing sector’s growth in February was fairly broad-based, with durable goods improving by 1.2 percent and nondurable goods increasing by 0.3 percent. The largest gain was in...
MAPI predicts manufacturing production in Latin America will post a weak 0.5 percent growth rate in 2012, dragged down by a manufacturing recession in Brazil and a sudden stop in output growth in Argentina. Mexico’s manufacturers are in relatively better shape, benefiting from solid U.S. demand and...
In going through books and materials stored in a MAPI office, I found a first edition of Paul Samuelson’s text, Economics: An Introductory Analysis, published in 1948. Samuelson was the first American to win the Nobel Prize in Economics. He made an incredible number of contributions to economics,...
In going through books and materials stored in a MAPI office, I found a first edition of Paul Samuelson’s text, Economics: An Introductory Analysis, published in 1948. Samuelson was the first American to win the Nobel Prize in Economics. He made an incredible number of contributions to economics...
The Eurozone is back in recession. This second downturn is wide-ranging and we see little support of aggregate demand. Regional differences in manufacturing performance persist, and total industrial output fell 2.3 percent in the third quarter in the Eurozone and 2.7 percent in the EU27. Slovakia,...
The central theme of MAPI’s forecast for the next five years is that we believe the U.S. economy is in the midst of a transition period from sluggish growth to a longer period of moderate growth. For a smooth transition, politicians must (1) compromise and not go over the fiscal cliff, (2) raise...
MAPI Senior Economist Kris Bledowski sees continued malaise in manufacturing and construction in the Eurozone. Industrial production will fall some 2 percent this year and rise just under 1 percent in 2013. There are, however, large regional differences in economic performance. He reviews economic...
Brazil’s economy in general, and manufacturing in particular, have seen their competitiveness erode over the past several years, clearly limiting long-term growth prospects; however, the country’s poor growth performance is arguably more of a structural issue than just a cyclical one. Specifically...