Economic activity in the manufacturing sector expanded in March for the eighth consecutive month, and the overall economy grew for the 11th consecutive month.
The biggest news in this report is employment went up to 56.1% and the trend lines for manufacturing hiring has finally started to move upward. ISM reports this is the highest reading since 2005. The ISM manufacturing employment graph below shows anything below zero (normalized to 50, the contraction/expansion point for the ISM) is contraction and above is expansion. As you can see, we have a manufacturing hiring expansion trend line (finally) from the survey.
The January 2010 ISM for manufacturing was released today and PMI was in at 58.4%. Even employment plans are above 50 and had a 3.1% change. A value above 50 in the ISM means growth.
I think this is the first indicator above December 2007 levels, the official start of this recession, so this is a very good, sign of life report.
The Institute for Supply Management released their May report this morning.
Just about every category improved. The overall reading of 42.8, while technically contraction, has in the past generally coincided with actual expansion of the manufacturing sector.*
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