The headline of the piece was “manufacturing gains likely to spur Fed’s stimulus cuts.” The actual news was that manufacturing output was reported as rising 0.8 percent in February, reversing most of a 0.9 percent decline in January. It’s a bit hard to see this as solid growth. If we add in December, manufacturing has grown at a 0.4 percent annual rate over the last three months.

Manufacturing output is just 1.5 percent above its year ago level. This has led to a drop in the capacity utilization rate of 0.1 percentage point to 76.4 percent. It is pretty hard to see this as an argument for cutting back stimulus.