U.S. Factory Orders Rise a Weak 1.4%

Orders to U.S. factories for manufactured goods were flat in December, the government said today. For the year, orders rose just 1.4%, the slowest advance in four years.

The Commerce Department reported that orders for durable and non-durable goods totaled $235.6 billion in December and $2.9 trillion for the year, the smallest gain since 1986, when orders fell 1.2%.

The weak December pace came on the heels of a revised 5.8% plunge in November, the largest drop since December, 1974, when orders fell 7%. The November figure originally was reported to have been 5.9%.

Factory orders are a key economic barometer of manufacturing industry plans for production. A decrease may forecast a continuing slump in that sector and the loss of more jobs.

The Labor Department reported earlier that factory payrolls fell by 33,000 in December, meaning that nearly 600,000 manufacturing jobs have been lost since December, 1989.

In today’s report, the department said a revised 3.4% gain in durable goods offset a 3.4% drop in non-durables. The department estimated last week that durable orders had gained 4.4%.

Orders for durable goods--big-ticket items expected to last more than three years--totaled $120.3 billion but failed to regain November’s 10.1% drop.

But the department said durable orders were concentrated in the defense and commercial aircraft orders and that, excluding those, orders actually fell 4.7%.

Non-durable goods totaled $115.3 billion.