Of course it is. By its very definition, it produces. It turns out goods – often in high quantities.
But does manufacturing have high productivity?
Yes, it does. Over the years, manufacturing has adopted lots of new technologies – and all of these have had a positive effect on productivity… reducing the time taken to produce goods – and reducing the number of people required to produce them.
What this all means is that over the years since the Industrial revolution brought about the modern manufacturing sector, productivity has risen massively. This has resulted in those who own and run the sector becoming wealthy – in some cases, massively wealthy.
In the early decades, it also saw massive growth in labour as people flocked from the countryside to the cities and took up jobs in the emerging manufacturing sector.
This was accelerated as agricultural productivity also rocketed and the demand for labour in the farms and fields steadily diminished.
But more recently the rise in automation, in robotics – and now in AI – has seen the need for manufacturing labour decline.
So, manufacturing still generates wealth – but that wealth is shared by fewer people!
The continuing rise in robots and AI will mean fewer opportunities for people to engage in well-paid, skilled work in the sector. Fewer people still will share in the wealth generated.
If these trends continue unabated, we might one day see a world where a few mega-factories produce lots of goods – and produce them with high productivity processes and systems … but there is no-one left to buy the goods produced. The potential customers are on the breadline – worrying not about new phones or TVs but about their next meal.
Please tell me my vision of the future is not real!.
Please tell me government – and academics – are working on new forms of government and policy that will prevent this future coming about!
Please tell me that the pursuit of higher productivity is not shortly to become counter-productive!