
Made in America is making a comeback.
The U.S. manufacturing industry seems to be gaining ground again after manufacturing jobs fell 33 percent between 2000 to 2010.
According to a recent Brookings study, the country as a whole saw a 2.7 percent increase in manufacturing jobs between 2010 and 2011.
Brookings found that manufacturing is a place-specific industry, mostly centered in the top 100 metropolitan areas in the nation. You can find the interactive map highlighting the statistics for the different metro areas here. When manufacturing businesses are located in close quarters with similar businesses, Brookings suggests this promotes innovation and the hiring of highly skilled, thus highly paid, workers.
Utah is no exception to this “manufacturing moment”—the state’s metropolitan areas are on the manufacturing bandwagon and are seeing modest increases, as well.
Salt Lake City experienced the fifth lowest drop in the country in manufacturing jobs when the U.S. manufacturing job market dropped. Brookings found that between 2010 and 2011, there was a 5.8 percent increase in manufacturing jobs in Salt Lake City, a 6.8 increase in the Provo-Orem metro area and an 8.4 percent increase in Ogden-Clearfield. In fact, Ogden-Clearfield ranked 11th out of the nation’s top 100 metro areas in this growth.
With the shift in the manufacturing scene, the need for highly trained engineers will likely increase–meaning education will play an even more critical role in the economic development as factories make more innovative and sophisticated products.
Businesses know an educated workforce is a critical element of enduring prosperity, and can make the difference in a successful and innovative products and business plans.
The business community stands in support of the Prosperity 2020 movement to strengthen Utah’s economy through improving education. Part of that objective is helping two-thirds of Utahns earn academic degrees or skilled trade certificates by the year 2020 and to have Salt Lake rank in the top 20 metropolitan areas for concentration on science and engineering occupations.

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