Do you happen to know what "Total Manufacturing" means in practice? I can't figure out what that series is measuring. It seems to be OECD data of some sort, but it doesn't have enough context to interpret.
One of the problems with US manufacturing is that it can be equal by, say, amount of money spent but get much worse productivity than Asia. And I'd believe it is a sophisticated method that accounts for that somehow, but I want to check it.
On a relative basis, yes. In absolute terms we are close to our pre-financial crisis peak [1].
[1] https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/PRMNTO01USQ661N