Finally, some good news about industry in the U.S.: Q1 2012 marked the full recovery of manufacturing wages from the Great Recession, according to The PayScale Index. Wages grew almost .5 percent over the previous quarter and were up 2 percent from last year.

Where is this quiet resurgence taking place? When most of us think of manufacturing, we probably think of automobile hub of Detroit or maybe steel towns like Pittsburgh. But Forbes's recent gallery of cities leading the manufacturing revival includes some areas that might surprise you.

Seattle-Tacoma-Bellevue, Wash. Do You Know What You're Worth? GET A FREE PAY REPORT The Seattle area was No. 2 in manufacturing growth for 2011, adding 164,000 manufacturing jobs in the course of the year for a 7.9 percent increase in employment. It's also one of the few places in the country where there are actually more manufacturing jobs today than there were five years ago.