Yes we need to correct our trade, tax, monetary and fiscal policies, and protect our borders and enforce our laws.
No, manufacturing jobs were not lost to productivity, they were were lost to overseas labor arbitrage and competition.
The article has numerous errors, chiefly productivity did not increase since 2001 by new technology and techniques. CapEx spending on new equipment has languished until about 2 months ago - so no new automation has been involved nor any new manufacturing techniques.
Productivity is up statistically mainly (not entirely) because low productivity jobs have moved overseas or been shutdown, leaving the more productive jobs here. The result is an increase in "productivity" but it is not more efficient use of labor and equipment. Service sector productivity is also poorly measured and seemingly adds to productivity assumed to have taken place in manufacturing - but again it is not reality.
And adjusting actual cash prices for "assumed quality changes" (known has hedonic pricing) is being removed by the BEA in the latest GDP benchmark revision because they agree (finally) it causes more distortion than help in understanding price changes and the real state of the economy.
We do get more function and features for our dollars, but that is actual and measurable by those who pay the cash for those features, and real dollars changes hands for it. Hedonic price adjustments (implemented in 1996) are just another statistical attempt to explain away rising real prices to keep the CPI (and hence government COLAs) down.