• The U.S. economy shrank 6% at the annual rate in the second quarter, extending the decline of 1.6% in the first quarter. The current forecast is for 0.8% growth in real GDP in the third quarter, with 1.6% annual growth in 2022. In 2023, the outlook is for 1.0% growth, but that forecast has sizable downside risks. Indeed, more than 63% of respondents to the NAM Manufacturers’ Outlook Survey predicted there would be an official recession in 2022 or 2023.
  • With that said, manufacturing value-added output increased to $2.768 trillion in the second quarter, an all-time high. Manufacturing accounted for 11.0% of value-added output in the U.S. economy in the second quarter, the highest percentage since the fourth quarter of 2019.
  • Yet, real value-added output in the manufacturing sector decreased for the second consecutive quarter from a record pace at the end of 2021, as expressed in chained 2012 dollars, suggesting that higher prices were inflating the record-setting nominal output data.