麦肯锡-美国农村制造业：K-12行业伙伴关系计划（英）

August 2025Manufacturing in rural America: A plan for K–12–industry partnershipsA seismic threefold increase in advanced-manufacturing investment could transform rural America by driving economic growth, creating high-quality jobs, and revitalizing communities.This article is a collaborative effort by Duwain Pinder, Nora Gardner, Sarah Tucker-Ray, and Tracy Nowski, with Charlie Crosby and Doug Scott, representing views from the McKinsey Institute for Economic Mobility.The US economy has begun to undergo a seismic shift. The COVID-19 pandemic, geopolitical developments,1 and a global AI tech race have led executives to increase their focus on reshoring and resilience. Over the past five years, hundreds of billions of dollars in capital investments have flowed into US advanced manufacturing, with leading global companies making huge commitments.2Two features of this trend have so far gone overlooked. The first is its potential benefits for rural America. Indeed, a McKinsey analysis found that 63 percent of $1 trillion in announced advanced-manufacturing projects is anticipated to go to facilities within 15 miles of rural communities.3 Such business investment could substantially increase demand for qualified manufacturing workers in the United States, potentially resulting in a 2.1 million-worker shortfall by 2030. This gap highlights the second overlooked feature: the central role K–12 schools can play to ensure business and governments succeed in supporting the push to reshore. In particular, rural K–12 schools will be vital in preparing students for future-oriented, tech-enabled careers in advanced manufacturing.Industry and K–12 schools have a once-in-a-generation opportunity to join forces and usher in a brighter future for rural America’s businesses, communities, and students. The benefits of such a collaboration could be enormous: about $20 billion from improved productivity and employee retention and $34 billion in additional wages a year for rural American workers, according to McKinsey analysis. These transformative gains are by no means guaranteed. They depend on a sufficient supply of qualified workers, which in turn will require K–12 schools and industry to collaborate closely to develop and implement programs on a historic 1 Matt Watters, Shubham Singhal, and Zoe Fox, “How American business can prosper in the new geopolitical era,” McKinsey, April 23, 2025.2 “Fact sheet: The Biden-Harris Administration record,” The American Presidency Project, January 15, 2025.3 For more on how we define rural communities, please see: JP Julien, Nora Gardner, Sarah Tucker-Ray, and Shelley Stewart III, “Who is Rural America?,” McKinsey Institute for Economic Mobility, March 20, 2025, and our forthcoming article on the rural archetypes.4 “Geopolitics and the geometry of global trade: 2025 update,” McKinsey Global Institute, January 27, 2025.5 “Geopolitics and the geometry of global trade,” McKinsey Global Institute, January 17, 2024.6 “Total construct