9 Surprises for U.S. Manufacturing in 2009

By Jon Miller | Post Date: December 24, 2008 4:05 PM | Comments: 4

1. Will you shut up about kaizen, Tom? Newly appointed U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack sidetracks every cabinet meeting, committee meeting and press conference he is invited to with talk of lean manufacturing and kaizen until the Obama administration looks into it and decide to apply it to the U.S. government. The result of kaizen applied to the $3 trillion of annual government outlays is a 33% reduction in wasteful spending, which is immediately plowed back into economic stimulus programs and a virtuous cycle of economic growth, higher collections of taxes, reduced tax rates, further growth and prosperity.

2. Fordyota Motor Corporation. In a daring display of long-term thinking Ford and Toyota merge their operations in order to establish the standardization of hybrids as the vehicle of today, reduce redundant R&D efforts in the areas of hybrids and fuel-efficient vehicles, improve quality across the supply chain, and accelerate the adoption of lean management practices across American manufacturing. Learning from GM's lost opportunity to copy the success of NUMMI, Ford leadership succeeds in all areas.

3. Coup de grace for GM. The U.S. government lets General Motors die.

4. Henry Ford Street. Americans regain awareness of the vital importance of manufacturing to their economy and acknowledge the emptiness of making money purely from trading of money. The street in lower Manhattan which was named after the wall used to keep attacking natives at bay is renamed in honor of the man who said nearly a century ago, "A business that makes nothing but money is a poor kind of business." The Henry Ford Street Journal changes its name and runs a full page ad endorsing the change.

5. Making our own power. We begin building windmills, solar panels, tidal energy stations and other renewable energy machines in earnest. The U.S. government subsidizes a massive retooling of idled automotive, furniture and off-shored factories in order to lead the world in commercialize these green technologies within five years.

6. Thinking globally, buying locally. Americans decide it is smarter to pay a little more for items made locally in order to keep manufacturing jobs local, reduce carbon footprint, and revive small businesses. This results in a massive shift from cost-driven off-shoring to purpose-driven local sourcing by corporations such as Wal-Mart.

7. Twice in 60 years? Say it ain't so... Toyota announces layoffs of full-time staff within their North American factories in order to protect profits and improve shareholder value. The sitting CEO of Toyota resigns in shame.

8. GAAP is amended with inventory as a liability. The U.S. government, accounting community, and tax authorities recognizes the benefit to flexibility, cash flow and investment of treating inventory as a liability rather than an asset and make a policy change to amend GAAP (generally accepted accounting practices) to reflect this. This results in a stimulus of lean thinking among manufacturers and service companies alike.

9. Green collar jobs. Manufacturing becomes a desirable career path for young people once again with the future of U.S. manufacturing aligned towards research, development and mass production of environmental technologies.

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