A new report card from an Indiana university gives Connecticut a C+ for manufacturing and D+ logistics.
The 2016 Manufacturing and Logistics Report, prepared by Ball State University’s Center for Business and Economic Research (CBER) for Conexus Indiana, shows how each state ranks among its peers in several areas of the economy that underlie the success of manufacturing and logistics.
CBER director Michael Hicks pointed out that Connecticut dropped its grades in productivity and innovation (A to B-), manufacturing (from B to C+), human capital (from C+ to C) and logistics (from C- to D+).
Connecticut received the following grades:
- Manufacturing: C-
- Logistics: D+
- Human Capital:
- Worker Benefit Costs: F
- Tax Climate: D
- Expected Liability Gap: D-
- Global Reach: B+
- Sector Diversification: D
- Productivity and Innovation: B-
To measure manufacturing industry health, the study included three variables: The share of total income earned by manufacturing employees in each state; the wage premium paid to manufacturing workers relative to the other states’ employees, and; the share of manufacturing employment per capita.
The logistics grade was based on: The share of total logistics industry income as a share of total state income and employment per capita; commodity flows data by both rail and road; and, infrastructure spending as the per capita expenditure on highway construction.
Hicks also provides an analysis of why American advanced manufacturing is being transformed as the nation shifts toward more diversified industries and a more educated workforce in the companion study Advanced Manufacturing in the United States.
Advanced manufacturing is defined by the Brookings Institution as an industry sector with high levels of STEM-related occupations and research and development investment. Using Brookings Institution’s definition, CBER looked at each state’s advanced manufacturing employment as a share of total manufacturing employment in 2013.
Data shows that nationally STEM (science, technology, engineering and Mathematics) and white-collar jobs are growing in the advanced manufacturing sector, while blue-collar occupations have declined.
