Читать книгу Computer Aided Design and Manufacturing - Zhuming Bi - Страница 13

The life quality of human being relies on the availability of products and services from primary industry, secondary industry, and tertiary industry. According to the three‐sector theory (Fisher 1939), the primary industry relates to the economic activities to extract and produce raw materials such as coal, wood, and iron. The secondary industry relates to the economic activities to transfer raw or intermediate materials into goods such as cars, computers, and textiles. The tertiary industry relates to the economic activities to provide services to customers and businesses. The secondary industry supports both the primary and tertiary industries, since the businesses in the secondary industry take the outputs of the primary industry and manufacture finished goods to meet customers' needs in the tertiary industry. In contrast to the wealth distribution or consumption in the tertiary industry, the secondary industry creates new wealth to human society (Kniivila 2018).

A manufacturing system can be very simple or extremely complex. Figure 1.1a shows an example of blacksmithing where some simple farming tools are made from iron (Source Weekly 2012). Figure 1.1b shows an example of a complex car assembly line, which is capable of making Ford Escape cars (Automobile Newsletter 2012). Despite the difference in complexity, both of them are good examples of a manufacturing system since manufacturing refers to the production of merchandise for use or sale using labour and machines, tools, chemical and biological processing, or formulation (Wikipedia 2019a). Manufacturing is one of fundamental constitutions of a nation's economy. Manufacturing businesses dominate the secondary industry. Powerful countries in the world are those who take control of the bulk of the global production of manufacturing technologies. Over the past hundreds of years, advancing manufacturing has been the strategic achievement of the developed counties to sustain their national wealth and global power. The importance of manufacturing to a nation has been discussed by numerous of researchers and organizations. For example, a summary of the importance to the USA economy is given by Flows (2016) and Gold (2016) as follows:

1 Manufacturers contributed $2.2 trillion with ∼12% of gross domestic product (GDP) to the USA economy in 2015.

2 The manufacturing multiplier effect is stronger than in other sectors. For $1.00 spent in manufacturing, $1.81 is added to other sectors of the economy. Manufacturing has the highest multiplier effect. Gold (2016) argued that the impact of manufacturing has been greatly underestimated; it is supported by the findings of the Manufacturers Alliance for Productivity and Innovation (MAPI) Foundation that the total impact of manufacturing on the economy should be 32% of GDP and that the full value stream of manufactured goods for final demand was equal to $6.7 trillion in 2016.

3 Manufacturing employs sizeable workforces. The manufacturing sector provides ∼17.4 million jobs, or over 12.3 million.

4 Manufacturing pays premium compensation. Manufacturing workers earnt a high average of $81 289 annually in 2015.

5 Manufacturing dominates US exports; the United States is the No. 3 manufacturing exporter.

6 The US attracts more investment than other countries and foreign investment in US manufacturing grows; the foreign direct investment in manufacturing exceeded $1.2 trillion in 2015. New technologies allow manufacturers to alter radically the way they innovate, produce, and sell their products moving forward, improving efficiency and competitiveness.

Figure 1.1 A manufacturing system can be very simple or complex (a). Blacksmithing (Source weekly 2012), (b). Ford assembly line at Kansas City (Automobile Newsletter 2012).