US manufacturing productivity died in 2000, not 2010, because of imports

US manufacturing productivity stopped growing after 2010, but new research says the problem started a decade earlier. It turns out that a surge of imports in 2000 closed plants and destroyed jobs, which then led to less investment and innovation.

For years, economists wondered why US manufacturing productivity flatlined after 2010. This paper says the real damage happened much earlier, when a flood of imports shut down factories and cut jobs. It shifts the blame from more recent corporate decisions or regulations to a deeper, earlier structural change in the economy.