This week, we posted on early signs indicating some manufacturing jobs are returning to the US in select sectors and regions. I still think the evidence is anecdotal at this point. But if manufacturing jobs are truly to return to the United States, it will take a convergence of conditions to happen in any significant, [...]

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While there may be some early signs that the global economic recovery has begun, there is still a need to proceed with caution. The recession has sparked deep and widespread structural changes into how businesses operate, organize, capitalize and manage costs.
It has also created new state of normal for business — one in which supply [...]

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President Obama defended the US stimulus package’s ‘Buy American Clause’ yesterday at the Three Amigos Summit in Mexico. The President stressed the limited reach of the clause, the possibility for states and provinces to circumvent the provisions in some cases, and the administration’s interpretation that the policy is legal under WTO rules:

Frankly, it struck me [...]

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As we’ve discussed before, the recently enacted ‘Buy American’ clause was expected to have global ramifications if the proposed measures to supply public sector stimulus projects using domestically produced steel came to fruition. As we expected, the Buy American clause has been modified as the US was pounded by pushback from other nations. But, even [...]

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Our North American category management team hosted a Top 5 Categories to Source Now webinar last week (replay here). Supply Excellence contributor Pat Furey, set the stage with a discussion of several manufacturing, GDP and consumer indices, as well as a WSJ consensus forecast of economists, that all appear to show that the economy is [...]

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