Issue link: https://iconnect007.uberflip.com/i/950499
78 PCB007 MAGAZINE I MARCH 2018 had changed to only 20% in manufacturing and 80% in service. While these statistics are great news if you are selling insurance, they are catastrophic for the once mighty Ameri- can manufacturing sector. The sad state of af- fairs was that the United States was no longer a manufacturing nation. This is painfully ob- vious when looking at Figure 1, which shows that beginning around 2004, bartending jobs began to outpace manufacturing jobs. Reshoring This interesting buzz word surfaced around 2010 and refers to the return of work to Amer- ica that had been previously lost to offshore competition. This reversal was being driven by a number of factors as the economic con- ditions were forcing customers to change their focus from unit cost to total cost of ownership. Perhaps the grass isn't always greener on the other side (of the world)! The bulk of reshored jobs—about 60% from 2010 through 2016— came from China, according to a recent re- port by the Reshoring Initiative [3] . Labor has become more expensive in China than in the past, with Chinese wages going up 12−15% a year for the past 15 years. Figure 2 presents a breakdown by country of where all the reshor- ing jobs are coming back from. Reshoring Drivers: • Higher transportation and fuel costs • Increasing foreign wages • IP/counterfeiting concerns • Reduction of pipeline inventory for JIT • Localizing manufacturing near R&D facilities • Regulatory compliance risk • Design and delivery flexibility • Political and infrastructure stability • Improved U.S. competitiveness through Lean • Higher reject rates/quality • Product liability The Rebirth of 2017 There is no question that manufacturing in the U.S. is increasing, with companies not only Figure 1: Bartenders vs. manufacturing employees, 2000−2013.