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FACT BRIEF

If products were made in the United States, would the US cargo ship backlog not matter?

By Christiana Dillard
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NO

While the dollar amount of U.S. imports is higher than for exports, a social media post's premise that products are not made in the U.S. is not true. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, manufacturing is the country's fifth-largest employment sector with 12.1 million workers who produce goods for domestic use and export.

The U.S. is also the world's second-largest exporter of goods originating the U.S.

The cargo ship backlog that continued into October 2021 concerned not just finished products coming in. Materials used to manufacture products at American factories are imported into the country as well.

At the Port of Los Angeles -- North America's busiest container port -- top containerized imports in 2020 were products to be used in manufacturing others: auto parts and plastics were the second and fifth imports, respectively. The port's top containerized exports included scrap metal and fabric/raw cotton.

See a full discussion of this at Lead Stories
This fact brief is responsive to conversations such as this one.
Sources
US Trade Representative Countries and regions
US Census Manufacturing in America: 2021
ABOUT THE CONTRIBUTOR
Lead Stories
Lead Stories is a fact checking and debunking website at the intersection of big data and journalism that launched in 2015. It scouts for trending stories, images, videos and posts that contain false information in order to fact check them as quickly as possible. It actively monitors the fake-news ecosystem and doesn’t wait for reader tips or reports before getting started on a story.
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About fact briefs published on Gigafact
Fact briefs are short, credibly sourced summaries that offer “yes/no” answers in response to claims found online. They rely on publicly available, often primary source data and documents. Fact briefs are created by contributors to Gigafact —a nonprofit project looking to expand participation in fact-checking and protect the democratic process. See all fact briefs here.