It is axiomatic to anticipate manufacturing & employment to seriously decline in the absence of yields combined with cascading volumes, one only needs to look at Dow Transports & Baltic Dry Index to verify the facts! But why is yield & volume dropping? Answer: Creative Destruction! The post WWI & WWII industrial economy is being updated....the capitalists have sold obsolete plant & equipment to third world China... consider the economy that grew up around wood hulled sailing ships, there were people who supplied cotton for sails, trees for masts & hulls, nails, etc. And the government bought these ships for military use along with private shipping companies... alas but When the technically more efficient steel hulled steam ship was introduced, the wood hulled sailing ship was immediately obsolete. Do you think the obsolete VESTED sailing industry went down w\o a fight? They bribed politicians & corrupted the system in a fatal attempt to save their long time industry. Most of the specialized wood hull industries & employees lost their jobs & incomes... Same thing is happening today as CNC (computerized numerical code) industrial robotic production machines take over & replace obsolete production capacity requiring less human interaction & labor.....China, IMO has been suckered into obsolete machinery & their pissed off, so they send us knock-offs, tainted lead toys & drugs etc.! The U.S. economy is transitioning like it did 1931 - 1945....many Dow & SnP components are obsolete or will be very soon, just like last time, but their not going down w\o a fight....and they employ fraud, bribery & corruption to fight for their very survival....