One year after the economic recession arrived in full fury, pummeling industrial companies in the United States and abroad, a clear sense of confidence in a recovery has surfaced as manufacturers shift their focus to growth initiatives that will help them climb out of the worst downturn since the 1930s.
Manufacturers across the United States and Europe say that their feelings about the health of their economies and their own business prospects going into 2010 have improved by a wide margin since the dark months of late 2009, when financial markets were teetering on the brink of collapse, credit dried up, consumer spending sagged, and the unemployment rate surged toward double digits. Since then, stabilization in the financial and housing markets, slowing unemployment growth, and early signs of a return to stronger production activity have combined to ease the sense of crisis that marked 2009.
As a result, U.S. and European manufacturers now say they expect a gradual recovery in 2010, but they also signal that they will proceed very cautiously through the new year with capital and technology spending plans, and, most particularly, renewed hiring.
These are just some of the top-line findings of Managing Automation Media’s annual Outlook poll, conducted last month among readers of Managing Automation and MA’s year-old sister publication in Europe, Manufacturing Executive. Nearly 400 readers in the United States and Europe voiced their opinions on the state of their economies, their confidence levels in their own businesses, and their attitudes about technology investments this year. In addition, they shared their views on the year-old Obama administration’s efforts to revive the economy and aid manufacturing’s recovery.