by Calculated Risk on 3/17/2014 09:15:00 AM

From the Fed: Industrial production and Capacity Utilization

Industrial production increased 0.6 percent in February after having declined 0.2 percent in January. In February, manufacturing output rose 0.8 percent and nearly reversed its decline of 0.9 percent in January, which resulted, in part, from extreme weather. The gain in factory production in February was the largest since last August. The output of utilities edged down 0.2 percent following a jump of 3.8 percent in January, and the production at mines moved up 0.3 percent. At 101.6 percent of its 2007 average, total industrial production in February was 2.8 percent above its level of a year earlier. The capacity utilization rate for total industry increased in February to 78.8 percent, a rate that is 1.3 percentage points below its long-run (1972–2013) average.
emphasis added

Click on graph for larger image.

This graph shows Capacity Utilization. This series is up 11.6 percentage points from the record low set in June 2009 (the series starts in 1967).

Capacity utilization at 78.8% is still 1.3 percentage points below its average from 1972 to 2012 and below the pre-recession level of 80.8% in December 2007.

Note: y-axis doesn't start at zero to better show the change.

The second graph shows industrial production since 1967.

Industrial production increased 0.6% in February to 101.6. This is 21% above the recession low, and slightly above the pre-recession peak.

The monthly change for both Industrial Production and Capacity Utilization were above expectations.