Whether it’s energy-saving wind turbines, life-saving pacemaker devices, state-of-the-art advanced avionics or super sleek smartphones, rare earth elements play an important role in helping a variety of the latest technologies perform.
A new rare earths economics report from the American Chemistry Council and Rare Earth Technology Alliance shows that billions of individual products from a myriad of product lines are absolutely essential to the economy of North America. Here are some key facts you need to know about the 17 rare earth elements and their economic contributions:
- The rare earth industry directly contributes to the North American economy with $795 million in shipments, employing nearly 1,050 workers with a payroll of $116 million.
- The rare earth industry generates a total of $1.9 billion in economic output in North America from a combination of the direct, indirect and induced output.
- The rare earth industry is supportive of $329.6 billion in economic output in “downstream” end-market products and technologies that employ 618,800 workers (with a combined payroll of $37.6 billion) in the United States and Canada.