Comparative Deindustrialization : A Note on American and British Manufacturing Since the 1970s

An examination of the manufacturing output of Britain and the U.S. (the two advanced industrial countries most associated with neoliberalism and "the Anglo-Saxon model") over time shows striking parallelism but also striking differences. In particular an examination of United Nations' statistics on the matter indicates a significant divergence after 1990, with British manufacturing stagnating in per capita terms, and America's continuing to expand. This paper examines that data, and explains the differences in terms of the U.S. enjoying successes in a small number of sectors (computer and electronic products, petroleum and coal products, chemicals and aerospace-defense goods), and suggests that to the extent that the U.S. has outdone Britain here, it is a matter of the government support that created its historic strength in the relevant sectors, notably computers and aerospace-defense; the country's continued high levels of defense spending; and the fossil fuel resources exploited in the shale boom (of which not just the oil and gas-oriented sectors, but chemicals especially and other parts of the industrial base have been beneficiaries); which have in at least some measure offset the broader trend of decline in the sector