Washington (awp / dpa) – Auto production rebounded sharply in July in the United States, a welcome increase in a sector still heavily affected by the global semiconductor shortage, and this is driving industrial production growth in the country .
Overall industrial production grew faster than expected last month, by 0.9%, according to data released Tuesday by the US Central Bank (Fed), against only 0.5% expected by analysts.
Industrial production is thus 6.6% above its level in July 2020, but remains 0.2% below that of February 2020, just before the pandemic.
In July, the production of cars and motor parts alone climbed 11.2%, but, despite this rebound, “vehicle assemblies continued to be constrained by a persistent shortage of semiconductors; motor vehicle production and parts in July was about 3.5% below its recent peak in January 2021, “the Fed said in the press release.
In detail, automobile production represents about “half of the increase in factory production” in the country, which itself increased by 1.4%, underlines the Fed.
Mining production also increased (+ 1.2%), but the production of public services (water, electricity) fell (-2.1%) in July.
In addition, the industrial capacity utilization rate continues to increase, and increases by 0.7 percentage point, reaching 76.1%, a rate 3.5 percentage points lower than the average calculated between 1972 and 2020. .
“We expect supply chain and hiring difficulties to slowly recede, but the Delta variant may reinforce these headwinds,” said Oren Klachkin, economist for Oxford Economics, in a note.
afp / lk
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