The decline in manufacturing jobs has been driven more by productivity gains attributed to technological advances than by overseas competition, said Edward Lazear, chairman of President George W. Bush's Council of Economic Advisors, recently in The San Jose Mercury News. Lazear argued that the U.S. shrinking manufacturing sector and the rise of its service sector are overblown.

Looking at another concern some Americans worry about, in 2006, exports outpaced imports by 13 percent to 10 percent, creating a start toward a better balance of trade. (See: The Big Picture: India, China and U.S. Trade)

Switching from the rosy future to the seemingly unstoppable rising cost of healthcare, Mark McClellan, a former Bush administration officer in the Food and Drug Administration, said "it's clear that much of the money spent on healthcare is wasted, and figuring out ways to mitigate the waste represents an opportunity."

Dow Jones MarketWatch viewed the near-term future less optimistically. It notes, "the American labor market … is expected to begin to finally show some wear and tear, economists said. 'The job market is starting to look a little more shaky,' said the economic team at Merrill Lynch in a research note. Job growth is expected to slow to 100,000 jobs in February after averaging 155,000 over the past four months. Many economists are forecasting job growth below 100,000, which would be the first month with sub-100,000 job growth since January 2005. January job growth was 111,000." (See: U.S. Manufacturing: Up, Down, All Around)

The Manufacturing sector is expected to continue to shed jobs. Turning to yesterday's Wall St. Journal, we see, "[The Institute for Supply Management's February nonmanufacturing report] was surprisingly strong in January, and markets are looking for another positive reading on the service sector," according to the WSJ. Tomorrow the Fed releases its "beige book" report on regional economic activity. Today, the report on fourth-quarter productivity will spotlight labor costs.

In an article entitled, "Clinton Brings Debt Woes to Fore," WSJ writers Deborah Solomon and John Harwood note that "foreign interests own about 50 percent of the public debt not held by the U.S. government, compared with about 20 percent in the '90s." Of course, voters — and everyone else — are also concerned with jobs and wages. And the jobless rate for February is expected to be 4.6 percent.

Moreover, demand for U.S.-made manufactured goods dropped 5.6 percent in January, the largest decline since July 2000, the Commerce Department reports just today. A 60 percent plunge in orders for new civilian aircraft led the decline, though most industrial sectors saw falling demand. Orders for core capital equipment fell 6.3 percent, the biggest decline in three years. Orders for durable goods fell 8.7 percent, revised from last week's 7.8 percent estimate.

In January, the IMT blog noted the rise of the Chinese yuan and the decline of the U.S. dollar in world currency markets, and economists predict that the dollar fall and recession will continue in 2007. According to "econometrician" John Williams, "In 2007, we are likely to see the economic downturn of 2006 develop into a structural recession and yet we have international trade and federal budget deficits careening out of control."