The seasonally adjusted ISM-Milwaukee Manufacturing Report, compiled by Marquette University’s Center for Supply Chain Management, jumped in May to 57.7 from 52.9 in April, indicating rising production rates at factories in the southeastern Wisconsin and northern Illinois region.
Any reading above 50 indicates expansion.
The index reported growth in the Purchasing Managers Index (PMI), new orders, production, employment, inventories, prices, backlog of orders and exports and declines in supplier deliveries, customers’ inventories and imports.
Meanwhile, the U.S. economy ran into a deeper soft patch in the first quarter than initially estimated, as the Commerce Department estimated today that the economy grew at a 1.9 percent pace in the first quarter, slower than the 2.2 percent rate initially reported.
The revised rate is down from a 3.0 percent growth rate of real gross domestic product, the output of goods and services produced in the United States, in the fourth quarter.
Also today, the number of Americans seeking unemployment benefits rose last week to a five-week high, evidence that the job market remains sluggish.
The Labor Department said weekly applications for unemployment aid rose 10,000 to a seasonally adjusted 383,000. The four-week average, a less volatile measure, increased for the first time in a month to 374,500.
In Wisconsin, the number of first-time unemployment benefit applicants rose last week to 9,518 from 9,063 in the previous week, according to the Department of Workforce Development.
The disappointing national numbers prompted the Dow Jones Industrial Average to decline by more than 70 points this morning, putting a cap on a dismal month for the stock market.
