What Makes Assembly in the United States Attractive?

The volatility and uncertainty resulting from trade wars and the COVID-19 pandemic, coupled with increased consumer demand for faster delivery, customization and responsiveness, is helping to promote reshoring and foreign direct investment (FDI) in the United States. Reshoring and FDI are both motivated by the same logic: the agility and financial advantages that companies achieve by producing near their customers. Let’s examine the top three industries that are reshoring to ascertain what makes assembly in the United States attractive. Ironically, the industries that are most actively reshoring today are those that probably should not have left in the first place. (See table below) The top three are assembly-intensive industries: transportation equipment, electronics and appliances.