Gross national product and basic manufacturing industries in the United States

This report analyzes and compares trends in the growth of real GNP and real output in manufacturing and basic manufacturing in the Unites States between 1950 and 1982. As a corollary, the report also looks at trends in the real output growth of six basic manufacturing industries in the same period: primary metals, motor vehicles and equipment, textile mill products, paper and allied products, chemicals and allied products, and rubber and miscellaneous plastic products. The results indicate, among other things, that (1) manufacturing is not in imminent danger of disappearing, as some proponents of the "deindustrialization" thesis seem to believe, (2) since the mid-1970s, basic manufacturing at once is contributing less and less to national income and continues to be greatly influenced by changes in national income, and (3) it can be misleading to treat all basic American manufacturing industries as though they constitute a homogeneous sector facing the same competitive challenges and commercial opportunities.,CRS 84-597 E,"April 10, 1984.",SuDoc# LC 14. 18/3