MAPI – Manufacturers Alliance Economic News and Reports

Issues in Brief

Lifting the Crude Oil Export Ban
This study, performed in collaboration with the Aspen Institute and Inforum, estimates that capital investment would increase and that as many as 37,000 manufacturing jobs could be created annually through 2025 if the ban on crude oil exports were lifted.

The Economic Consequences of China’s Housing Market Slowdown
A significant retrenchment in China’s housing prices would dampen the country’s fixed asset investment, retail sales and exports, and risk financial stability. Asian and Latin American economies would likely be most affected.

The New Factory: The current disruptive epoch of technological advancement
Lean production practices and remarkable new technologies will continue to reshape the factory and fundamentally transform the very nature of what manufacturing does and can do.

Economic Update

China’s Economic Growth in 2014
Yingying Xu, director of economic studies at the MAPI Foundation, explains the slowdown of China’s recent economic growth and provides a forecast for GDP and industrial production growth in 2014.

European Economic Outlook: Still Waiting for a Firm Recovery
Europe’s industrial sector is struggling to take off decisively; consumers lack income while investors have cash but little confidence in demand to justify spending. Manufacturing production will rise at most 2.5% in 2015.

Latin American Manufacturing Update
While Mexico’s economy is showing signs of strength, Brazil and Argentina are confronting significant challenges. Frozen prices in key sectors are discouraging investment in Brazil, and inflation is eroding consumer purchasing power in Argentina.

MAPI Foundation Business Outlook October 2014
Despite the declines in many of the indexes, most remain at relatively high levels. This quarter’s wildcard questions asked about risks stemming from Ebola, ISIS and other international developments.