u.s. manufacturing, an early casualty of automation that is making a comeback because of it.s tesla factory in california turns out battery-powered cars, using state-of-the-art robots that can change tools and perform a multitude of different tasks, negating some of the advantages of moving jobs offshore. annual investment by u.s. manufacturers in new technology has increased almost 30% since the recession ended, and research institutions and robotics companies, funded by venture capital, are constantly searching for innovations, like the roomba vacuum cleaner. >> rodney brooks: traditional robots inside factories... >> kroft: that was the brainchild of rodney brooks, a pioneer who ran the artificial intelligence lab at m.i.t. before launching i-robot, one of the most successful robotics companies in the u.s. this is his latest progeny, a friendly, affordable chap named baxter. >> brooks: it's meant to be able to go in a factory where they don't have robots at the moment, and ordinary workers can train it to do simple tasks. >> kroft: uh-huh. such as? >> brooks: well, a simpl

u.s.-dedicated manufacturing for 10 or 15 years. and so they realize it's better to have the whole supply chain closerrer together, and particularly to have r&d closer together. bring back the products to america and now they're in the process of saying what did we lose in that 10 or 15-year period. as has been mentioned up here, a lot of the manufacturing work force is aging. one of the rock star positions in the manufacturing plant would be an industrial maintenance technician. these guys, and they're usually guys, they can fix anything, you know? whether it's a hammer or a

u.s. manufacturing including global market share for manufacturing is telling us loudly and clearly that forese individual antidepressant dotes -- antidotes told on reshoring, the united states, if anything, loses competitiveness as a location for manufacturing. gerri: all right. mark, to you, once you came back, what did you experience in the country in the competitive positioning? >> so that's a great question. so let me preface that we're a green technology company helping large water users conserve water through a lot of technology. we have complicated electronics that we communicate to wirelessly and through software, and when we looked at the product line and we were looking for partners to help us with that. it started with innovation. when we wanted to accelerate the pace of innovation to understand what was going on right here in silicon valley at the heart of this great ecosystem of entrepreneurship and technology, we started there and collaborated with a great manufacturing partner that we've been working with for three years to really relaunch an update our products and launch ne

u.s. manufacturing. actually, it's only in guatemala city, but it was conceived, designed and made in america. the world's largest christmas tree-- 8,300 branches, over 1.5 million l.e.d. lights, all timed to music driven by computers. housed in a semi-trailer inside the 57 foot base. a world class tourist attraction worth millions to the central american beer company that paid for it. its logo sits right up there on top. >> basically, think of this christmas tree as the bellagio water fountain up on a christmas tree. we do not keep stock. macy's will come in and say, "we want a bunch of elves, but we don't want them dressed this way." >> reporter: nick barrango is the technology expert at barrango corporation of south san francisco, california, a preeminent player in the $2 billion-a-year visual merchandising business. >> we create props, decorations, displays for stores, shopping malls, amusement parks, any commercial properties. >> reporter: this all started right after the san francisco earthquake. a

u.s. manufacturers for more tests. both japan and the u.s. right now investigating problems with that main battery overheating which ultimately led to the emergency landing. so far, investigators at this point have not been able to figure out exactly what caused the overheating. >>> this one's an interesting story here. one of the most famous newspapers in the entire world may have been penetrated by chinese hackers. officials from "the new york times" say over the past four months, hackers stole reporters' passwords and investigation files from its network system. security experts hired by the paper tracked the attacks to china and found some of the computers are linked to the chinese military. these attacks ironically happening during the very same time period as a times investigation detailing how chinese premier has built a $2 billion fortune. >>> tonight marks the end of the road for the comedy "30 rock." a final one-hour episode airs tonight with some celebrity cameos and a few tears. >> jane cried so much these last two weeks, we went

u.s. manufacturing. buyers, though, were able to step in, with the blue chips mong hher. it wasisappointment over the facebook announcement that led to more selling in textbook shares as apple's stock continued for the second day in a row. the dow industrials closing up 27 points, and the nasdaq lost six, with the s&p 500 rising almost two points. >> as tom mentioned, we got an early read on how american factors are doing. and it is not good. manufacturing contracted for the sixth straight month. and the federal reserve tallied the numbers and said the index for december was preured by a dropi in new orders and shipment. and the conditions index fell to minus 7.8. clr in december. any reading below zero suggests contraction. economists were expecting a flat reading. some business watchers believe that weakness in manufacturing will continue. >> well, i think the weakness in manufacturing is a chronic weakness that has been going on for quarter after quarter, period after period, and the problem is the underlying competitiveness of the u.s. these data... this slow recovery

u.s. manufacturing. buyers, though, were able to step in, with the blue chips moving higher. it was disappointment over the facebook announcement that led to more selling in textbook shares as apple's stock continued for the second day in a row. the dow industrials closing up 27 points, and the nasdaq lost six, with the s&p 500 rising almost two points. >> as tom mentioned, we got an early read on how american factors are doing. and it is not good. manufacturing contracted for the sixth straight month. and the federal reserve tallied the numbers and said the index for december was pressured by a drop i in new orders and shipment. and the conditions index fell to minus 7.8. clr in december. any reading below zero suggests contraction. economists were expecting a flat reading. some business watchers believe that weakness in manufacturing will continue. >> well, i think the weakness in manufacturing is a chronic weakness that has been going on for quarter after qrter, period aer period, and the problem is the underlying competitiveness of the u.s. these data... this slow recover

u.s. manufacturing jobs. liz: my dad was a surgeon, he used to talk about you guys all the time.y, very innovative. you have to be. let me play devil's advocate. i know they are bigger. you look at your stock, for example, in the past year, you are up more than 55%. with billions added to that insurance rolls, it will wash over the 2.3% excise tax. you will get so many more customers for your products which, in your case are, well, the neurological devices. more people will be demanded upon it. >> that has not proven to be the case. we do not expect it to be the case going forward. when we look at the case of massachusetts where there was care provided for all citizens, we did not see an increase. most patients that use our devices are covered by the care. what we are talking about with this policy are younger patients who are typically healthier and do not devices. when we are paying a 2.3% device tax it has already impacted lots of jobs. it will impact innovation. liz: any chance you will see a repeal of at least that tax or some kind of compromise? >> we think anything short o

u.s. manufacturers and asian manufacturers european manufacturers are only starting to see the real benefits of the kinds of smart phone and table tecology they produced in the last few years. a lot of emerging markets are going to be huge markets for companies like apple and google and microsoft and nokia. so they are really pushing for lower end, in some ways lower priced screens and devices as well as some of the cutting edge higher end more expensive devices. samsung came up with a very interesting 5.5 inch flexible screen that kind of makes you imagine all kinds of possibilities of how ot screen can be used. you can, for example, bend a screen in your hand if you are holding on to say a subway rail and reading an ebook with the other hand and fold it into the cup of your hand. these are really interesting possibilities. and it creates new markets and new avenues for growth for these companies. >> in recent years companies we really didn't think of as makers of equipment, amazon, gooeling, microsoft, places that have earned their bones in other parts of the computing or communications bu

at the same time with 300,000 jobs open in the manufacturing space in the u.s. alone. another question is what is the niche of going to look like? pretty much every 30 projects and i would agree that 40% and even more of those jobs in manufacturing will require a postsecondary education. .. the corporation. i think that is one of the most natural -- corpg it's happening already. we have a number of programs underway successfully. because you suffer from a lack of people if you don't take it in to your own hands. >> that's a big challenge and it's a a challenge that most people today go to an education system don't understand what a manufacturing job looks like. the image they have on the manufacturing job is that you come in early in the mortgage with a white shirt and leave in the evening with a dirty shirt. right. and so that's so far from the reality. and -- [inaudible] dirty. so that's so far from the reality today. that we got to make manufacturing sexy again. i think it starts with bringing people in to our plans making having them look at what is going on. how hi

u.s. manufacturing renaissance and he joins me from chicago. welcome, hal.talk about retail sales. >> good to be with you. >> and also talk about housing start numbers for december. what do you think this is going to tell us about where our economy is and where we are going? >> the economy had a rocky period, especially because of the last fiscal cliff. we were concerned that companies and consume verse stopped spending. what we will find out this month is whether that is true or not. most important is retail sales. retail sales and the consumer account for about 60% of all of our economy. except the consumers are spending the economy tends to do well. in the month of november, before the fiscal cliff, retail sales grew by about .3%. not a bad number what we are seeing from some of the economists that provide consensus forecasts is the number about .4%. that .4% would be a very good sign if the economy hits that number so we all should you can hopeful that it does. we are also looking at other things like housing starts. as we all new york the housing market

u.s. manufacturing sector returning to expansion last month inching up to 50.7 from 49.5 in november. any reading above 50, we will take it even though it is slightly above indicates expanding activity. david: we have peter barnes live in washington with exactly how much your taxes will rise next year. giving us their favorite stocks to kick off 2013, but let's start where the action really began. no doubt what happened inside the beltway affected the market. how much will we be paying? peter: we have a whole bunch of taxes this year including from this week's tax bill, starting last night, looking at their impact on different income brackets for each hour of the day today. this hour we're wrapping up with millionaires and billionaires. household income of a million dollars annually or more covering 300,000 households filers. the big change that will affect them is restoration of the top marginal tax rate of 39.6 from the clinton era for individuals making more than 400,000 per year are from is making a $450,000 for those taxpayers also said the raids on the cap gains and dividends ri

u.s. manufacturing activity rose last month after contracting in november.ing picke pickup point into t economic growth heading into the new year. the institute said the index of manufacturing activity rose slightly in december. november's reading was the lowest since july of 2009, one month after the recession ended. avis is buying zipcar for $490 million expanding its offering from traditional car enterental. they unanimously approved the buyout. shares of zipcar are up in the market. now continuing our "countdown to the closing bell" with liz claman. liz: okay. so 270 plus points from the high of the session. nicole petallides, i think things are heating up in the last couple minutes of trade. >nicole: no doubt. you have a deal made in washington which helped bring the market to all grain on the screen. you don't even have to look at the numbers, look at this, green across the board. that is the action we have seen, but talk about small-cap moving to new highs. so many names hitting 52-week highs, bank of america, ford just to name a few. financials doing

u.s. manufacturing side, fedex and kansas city southern was in the news today as well on the transport side. we're more aggressively leveraged in our stock picks. >> thank you very much for stopping by. >> good to be here. >>> on deck, a little trivia here for you. is it's taken the equivalent of 1001 trips to the moon and dak what is it? and one analyst says don't bail yet on boeing. stick around. own way. with scottrade's smart text, i can quickly understand my charts, and spend more time trading. their quick trade bar lets my account follow me online so i can react in real-time. plus, my local scottrade office is there to help. because they know i don't trade like everybody. i trade like me. i'm with scottrade. (announcer) scottrade. voted "best investment services company." ♪ [ male announcer ] every car we build must make adrenaline pump and pulses quicken. ♪ to help you not just to stay alive... but feel alive. the new c class is no exception. it's a mercedes-benz through and through. see your authorized mercedes-benz dealer for exceptional offers through mercedes-benz financial servi

u.s. continues to a favorite strong position, and it's a nice markham has a lot of manufacturing implications. and a place that we used to treat as a swing plan which is down in texas is a big refinery, the only refinery we have in the u.s. energy costs and yes were outrageously high. this is now one of our -- we are bringing back to play a full load, play a full load world. so that's all the good things that's happening, right. but then what is the risk or opportunity must if you look at the numbers, in the next years, through 2018, 2.7 million manufacturing jobs, people will retire. so we have, we have, you can see, i see it as an opportunity and shovel a lot of people that are leaving the work force. at the same time, currently with about 300,000 jobs open in a manufacturing, in the u.s. alo alone. and then the question, what is the new job going to look like? pretty much everybody projects and i would agree with that, that about 40% is even more of those jobs in the future are in manufacturing will require a full education. so that gets us how do we deal with educational site. i do want t

u.s. manufacturing. buyers, though, were able to step in, with

u.s. manufacturing. buyers, though, were able to step in, with

u.s. almost manufactures help upgrade the efforts of taiwan for example a territory china still claims as its own i mean what would it do to washington relations. well obviously it's not going to help relations at all and of course taiwan is one of the most sensitive parts of the entire region and has long been a vision to the place that might be the tinderbox that sets off the bigger explosion in the region so i think china definitely beijing has its eye on what's happening with taiwan and the effort to retrofit the f. sixteen fleet of taiwan and also the japanese x. ray to expand radar for example that just recently has is being expanded and worked on i think has to be seen as a threat by china as well so i think definitely we're going to see an increase in tensions and that will probably create more situations like we saw in the past year with the dispute between japan and china ok independent journalist james corbett thank you for your time today you're welcome. while the asia pacific is largely to take a lot of the limelight in twenty thirty eight as we've just heard later on artie's

u.s. manufacturers.to increase because asia labor costs are going up and shipping costs are going up as well. dagen: walmart has a history of hiring veterans. this is not anything new. it is illustrated in the executive comments. >> the world's biggest retailer. the workforce about the size of the u.s. military. he wants military veterans. this will be a great pr because of the negative reactions and union protests around the country. it is an interesting pr move. he wants them, he thinks they are great workers. connell: today it is all positive. thank you, liz. dagen: already the largest private employer. despite being non-union. connell: lance armstrong denied doping allegations for 13 years, but finally told the truth about something. could he be facing criminal charges for perjury and doping pressure mark. dagen: here are today's winners on the s&p 500. ♪ connell: lance armstrong admits doping in it interview with oprah winfrey. how much it could cost them. cadillac unveils an electric car or is it j

u.s. manufacturers. so now he is also announcing $50 billion will be spent to get more u.s.-mart shelves. big picture push here, that is out of 455 billion in revenues. so that a drop in the bucket. lori: great wal-mart is hiring veterans but is it cost effective to do so? do they certain type of job training? >> he didn't say that. he didn't get into that. all throughout the keynote which i read, he is essentially saying these guys and women are great workers and they're very organized and very focused. in their home office in bentonville arkansas, they have military vets as well. they're saying they are good for the workforce and good for wal-mart. great pr move at a time union protests are really coming down on wal-mart. interesting move. lori: unemployment among veterans is higher than the national average. >> good point. lori: thanks, emac. tracy: thanks, girl. lori: how disney is hoping to break through on gaming. dennis kneale has this one next. tracy: look how the dollar is faring as we head out to break. we'll be right back. she knows you like no one else. and you w

u.s. manufacturing. but nevertheless, i think you are seeing for fundamental reasons have pretty good strength in the u.s. >> well, that was jim's view. chris, what do you take away from the minutes yesterday? it had a big impact on the dollar, pushing benchmark yields higher, as well. i think we have to be contextualizing what comes out for minute statements compared with headlines. and i think that the real issue has been the fed has decided in the last six months to start actively talking about policy as part of the policy, if you like. it's the giving voice to what's going on. and we've heard a lot more from the fed about what it's anticipating doing in 2013/14. the idea that there's probably a relatively even balance, bear in mind we have new fed members coming in this year, there's a relatively even balance between people that think you should do more accommodate than not. it takes take away the weapons the fed was already working with until we saw the unemployment level coming down to the kind of l

u.s. manufacturing and assets to help -- both u.s. nufacturing in the assets to help our economy grow stronger. it is facing its own fiscal cliff. i will soon be introducing a bill that will allow the city to refinance its considerable debt at a lower interest rate, saving it. furthermore, i am proposing eliminating capital gains taxes on investment. it is a way to spur investment. saying that, in the city of jewish right we have an -- anoietroit we have extraordinarily high number of people who have lost hope because they are not working. they're out the metropolitan region -- throughout the metropolitan region we have thousands of job better going unfilled because they cannot find people qualified to be hired into those jobs. we have a skills gap in detroit as well as in this country. i know you understand these economic challenges we are facing. how you feel investing in assets innovation would help us close that gap? >> i in the first university graduate in my family. the only reason i studied science and came to this country becau

closer to home, an index for manufacturing activity in the u.s. is showing encouraging signs this month. in our cover story, the preliminary flash purchasing managers index for manufacturing shows new orders at hundreds of companies across the u.s. at their highest level in more than 2.5 years. keith mccloud, whose laurens, iowa, company helps employees position heavy objects in the workplace, says finally, there's a flood of orders to be filled. "i've been here 20 years, this is the businest its been." at this trade show, even the demonstrator models were sold. "we usually don't sell them but he needed it. it was a good deal." the institute for supply management's purchasing managers index asks manaufacturers about new orders, productions levels and inventory to come up with a snapshot of the relative strength of the manufacturing sector. a preliminary peek shows the biggest jump between december and january in 22 months. some say the fiscal cliff uncertainty kept orders on hold. "we closed a lot of business in december. once they finalized that,

u.s. certainly with regard to manufacturing, you've got the natural gas boom in the u.s. which is making it much more attractive for the u.s. to manufacture stuff on-shore as well as 3g, 2g manufacturing. are there any factors on the software side that can have an impact on some of the offshoring that has occurred to india over the past 15 years. >> fundamentally if you look at it, europe is still not very intensive. the u.s. is a market which will need external support. i don't think outsourcing from u.s. companies will change because of existing revenue. but the factor, whether they would have new companies or add to the philippines, that might be a challenge. but outsourcing, i think that continues. i don't think u.s. companies with just do it in house. >> but what about regulatory and tax risks in india? that has been a concern in many other sectors. this sector has benefited enormously from the software technology scheme and so on. is that goc to be more of a challenge as we go forward? >> i don't think so. i think the government has been very positive about the i.t.

u.s. has a long tradition of individual rights of citizens that many other countries don't have. >> for decades, the special interest gun lobby and the gun manufacturers in the u.s. are not regulated. every product in america is regulated, including toy guns. but the real guns that resulted 87 ducks per day, 3000 every month, the equivalent of a 9/11 attack every month in america from gun violence, and there's no regulation on guns and there's no background checks for all gun sales. the congress is completely owned. >> driving tests in south korea are becoming more high-tech. the road traffic authority says computer tablets are helping them to drive more safely. >> it can be nerve wracking experience, sitting for driving test. more so when you have to memorize the routes. that's a thing of the past. the road traffic authority has equipped the cars with computer tablets in korea. they're loaded with a gps program that tells drivers exactly where to go. 7 cent en'

u.s. munitions manufacturing. >> greta: the people making the money are actually a lot of people-- >> in private business. >> greta: in private business. >> right, but we give the money to it egypt to buy the weapons. >> greta: i always find astounding, nobody is beilookin at the connection between morsi and the president of sudan who has a munitions plant inside sudan israel to bomb because they were supplying hamas against israel. no one is following this circle. >> foreign and military aid, people say it's buying friendship, they won't be our friends if they won't do this. guess what? the people are not the same as leaders. and you can buy the leaders friendship, but sometimes the people don't see it that way. we've given billions upon billions and a pew research said that 74% don't like us, think of america as the enemy despite the billions we give them. and in egypt when the masses were rising against mubarak, do you think they were lape the tear gas sprayed on them was from pennsylvania, bought with u.s. aid? it doesn't always buy friendship, it often buys leaders, corrupt like mubarak and

u.s. in terms of manufacturing, in terms of product, and other infrastructure. and this is about long-term growth. so we are putting layer after layer of factors in place that will drive our growth. so, we are very much focused on executing our plan, responding to customer needs; and we have seen this growth now drive very strongly over the last three years, culminating in more than doubling our sales since 2009. > does vw plan to make more cars in the u.s.? > > what we have seen is a tremendous start-up - great success in tennessee - and we're really pleased to see how the passat has succeeded in the u.s. marketplace. we went from selling just 10,000 vehicles in a calendar year previously to over 10,000 a month of the new passat. so, we are still in that process of ramping up our presence with passat out of tennessee, and that is really our focus at the moment. > thank you for your time. that is jonathan browning of volkswagen. > > thanks angela. great to talk to you. enjoying the title "world's largest automaker" was short- lived for general motors. toyota is

u.s. is right now manufacturing firearm manufacturing industry exports four point four billion dollars to countries like algeria that's in the news today algeria then sends it to other countries that typically are under some type of embargo over arms by the united states the industry knows they've been doing this for decades sometimes you'll have an active a.t.f. investigator but the reason that story missed the press the reason the story is not being talked about is they don't understand it's a money story it's not that they don't want to have an a.t.f. chief it's just there's so much money involved in the four point four billion dollars of death that they spread all over developing countries that have six and hasn't there also been a not just the senate refusing to confirm. even though it's not a cabinet position the constitution doesn't require senatorial advice and consent but they've also been down funding or level funding or cutting funding to functions as i have they have not the republicans in congress been doing that as well they've been doing it for the last twelve years and the

u.s. bills. it manufactures u.s. coins and currency, it manages government accounts and the public debt. national banks and thrift institutions. it advises on domestic and international financial trade and tax policy and investigates and prosecutes tax evaders, counterfeiters, and forgers. if he's confirmed as treasury secretary, jack lew faces several challenges right off the bat. want to bring in our chief business correspondent, ali velshi. let's start with one of the most pressing issues -- raising the nation's debt ceiling. that's going to be a huge debate. >> yeah. >> and lew if confirmed will have a major role in that. >> yeah. and i agree with gloria. i don't think there's going to be a big confirmation battle. you have to really not like the treasury secretary to not confirm him. here's the thing, compare it to four years ago when tim geithner came in. geithner had been in the room prior to becoming treasury secretary when he was head of the new york federal reserve. they made the decision to let lehman brothers fail. he walked into a banking and a central bank global financial

u.s. manufacturing. we do think the monthly job gains could slow down a bit from the pace we saw in the fourth quarter. we might see a little bit of recovery has europe and japan start to grow. >> [inaudible] there seems to be a wide divergence with what your panel saw before. what are you seeing that the fed is not? >> that is a good point. the question was, our four consensus forecast is quite a bit lower than the fed central tendency is for economic growth in economic 2013. i get a sense from our discussions that we see the fiscal drag as may be a bigger factor than maybe the fed did the last time they did their projections. particularly, the potential for a prolonged debt ceiling fight and the sequestration spending cuts that are still enacted to take place, unless legislation changes in march of this year. how democrat to slow growth is pretty large on the sequestration spending -- and the potential to slow growth is pretty large on the sequestration spending cuts. we see a multiplier from those cut

u.s. has lost its manufacturing chops hasn't been to south carolina." south carolina is truly becoming the "it" state when it comes to economic development and job creation not just in the united states, but worldwide. with us tonight are a number of people who are proof positive that what we are doing is working, and i'd like to ask you to help me welcome these wonderful friends of south carolina. to those whose names i call, please stand and remain standing. and please hold your applause until the end. - representing 500 jobs in anderson and lexington counties, from michelin north america, inc., richard kornacki and that with the business community as our biggest cheerleaders, there is nothing we can't accomplish in the great state of south carolina. third, we have to address our crumbling infrastructure. our roads, our bridges, they simply aren't up to standard. more than 1,000 of south carolina's bridges are either load-restricted or structurally deficient. first and foremost, it is a public safety issue. the citizens of south carolina deserve to dr

from a pickup in housing, a drop in unemployment, and strength in manufacturing, has the u.s. economy has finally turned a corner? >> susie: and messy earnings news from two giant banks: a big earnings miss from citigroup, and a big earnings drop at bank of america. investors dump the stocks. >> tom: that and more tonight on "n.b.r."! >> susie: hundreds of flights were canceled today and airlines rushed to make back-up plans after regulators around the world grounded boeing's 787 dreamliner. those actions came after the federal aviation association ordered the plane out of the air after two incidents where lithium ion batteries overheated. boeing says it is confident the 787 is safe and says it stands behind the plane's overall integrity. this is only the second time in more than 30 years that regulators have grounded a plane. darren gersh reports. >> reporter: boeing has spent more than $30 billion developing the 787 dreamliner. one reason for the high cost is boeing's decision to upgrade the hydraulics and other mechanical systems with next-generation technology that runs on