LEARN / GLOSSARY
Industrial base
The set of firms, facilities, skills and materials capable of producing goods at a required volume and within a required time. Federal law defines the term to cover five countries.
Definition
Federal law defines the “national technology and industrial base” at 10 U.S.C. §4801(1) as the persons and organizations engaged in research, development, production, integration, services, or information technology activities conducted within the United States, the United Kingdom, Australia, New Zealand, and Canada.
The statutory definition is a policy construct rather than a statistical one, turning on the activities performed and on the countries in which they are conducted rather than on any industrial classification.
A separate and frequently conflated definition sits two paragraphs later in the same section. Section 4801(4) defines a technology and industrial base sector as a group of organizations that engage in, or are capable of engaging in, similar activities. The “capable of engaging in” language belongs to the sector definition. It does not appear in the definition of the national technology and industrial base, and merging the two overstates what the primary definition covers.
Why the dictionary version is insufficient
General reference works define the industrial base as a country’s manufacturing capacity. That formulation cannot distinguish between a firm that produces consumer goods and one that produces forgings for a weapons program, and it cannot accommodate the allied countries that the American statutory definition explicitly includes.
How it is measured
There is no single measurement. Census counts manufacturing establishments under NAICS sectors 31 through 33 on a territorial basis. Defense assessments work program by program and reach suppliers that no economic series identifies. The two approaches produce different answers about the same economy.
Measurement noteThe provision moved from 10 U.S.C. §2500 to §4801 effective January 1, 2022. Sources citing §2500 are citing a section number that no longer exists.
Related terms
Dual-use · Prime contractor · Sub-tier supplier · Surge capacity
Appears in
What Is the U.S. Industrial Base?
What Is Reindustrialization?
Read next
What Is the U.S. Industrial Base?
Sources
- 10 U.S.C. §4801, Definitions. uscode.house.gov
- U.S. Census Bureau, Annual Survey of Manufactures. census.gov