According to recently published data from the United Nations, the fear that China will displace the United States as the world's largest manufacturing nation has been realized. Manufacturing value-added in China totaled $1.92 trillion in 2010 while U.S. manufacturing value-added was $1.86 trillion.[1] China therefore accounted for 18.7 percent of world manufacturing in 2010 while the U.S. share was 18 percent. When measured in terms of U.S. dollars, China is the largest manufacturing nation in the world.
China Widens Lead as World’s Largest Manufacturer
According to the latest research from the United Nations, China has further outpaced its competitors in world manufacturing, generating $2.9 trillion in output annually versus $2.43 trillion from the U.S., the world’s second-largest manufacturing economy.
Over the last two years, China’s manufacturing sector has made strong gains, while the U.S. has been mired in economic and political doldrums.
“In 2011, China’s manufacturing output surged by 23 percent while manufacturing output in the U.S. only increased by 2.8 percent,” the American Enterprise Institute explains. “That brought China’s manufacturing output last year to more than $2.9 trillion, which was almost half a trillion dollars (and 20 percent) more manufacturing output than the $2.43 trillion of manufacturing output that was produced in the U.S. last year.”
Depending on what statistics you believe, the EU now exceeds the US in manufacturing output. In any event, it is about the same.
The reason for this is that it simply takes less human labor to produce a single unit of anything that can be produced by human hands. The number of "good paying jobs in manufacturing" that have been moved overseas is miniscule to the "good paying jobs in manufacturing" that have been lost to automation.
I have no source to verify your assertion. Regardless of the cause there are less good paying jobs in manufacturing. I might add that I have traveled to China and seen some of the factories that international businesses have set up there, including many US firms. They have the latest in automation technology. Coupled with cheap and educated labor, they can compete in terms of productivity.
The American worker is being threatened at home and abroad. The importation of foreign workers to take American jobs and depress wages does not bode well for our future.