Manufacturing in U.S. Shrank in August for Third Month

U.S. manufacturing shrank for a third month in August in the longest decline since the recession ended in 2009, threatening to deprive the world’s largest economy of a driver of growth.

The Institute for Supply Management’s factory index fell to 49.6 last month, the lowest since July 2009, from 49.8 in July, the Tempe, Arizona-based group said today. Economists in the Bloomberg survey projected an August reading of 50, which is the dividing line between expansion and contraction. Measures of orders and production dropped to three-year lows.