U.S. industrial production rises 0.2% in September

U.S. industrial production increased 0.2 percent in September, boosted by the expansion of manufacturing and mining sectors, the Federal Reserve said Monday. The September increase in industrial production, an indicator of the output of mines, factories and utilities, followed a revised unchanged performance in August. Manufacturing output, the largest component of the overall industrial production, rose 0.4 percent last month after a 0.3 increase in August. Manufacturing industry has shown strong performance since the U.S. economy began to recover from the recession about two years ago. The output of mines gained 0.8 percent in September, but the output of utilities decreased 1.8 percent. The report also showed that overall industrial capacity utilization -- a key measure of slack in the industrial economy -- rose slightly to 77.4 percent in September, 0.1 percentage point higher than the previous month, but is still 3 percentage points below its average from 1972 to 2010.