This is cited from the book Global economic history: a short introduction pg. 138:
In the mid 1970's, the japanese steel industry as exporting almost one third of its output, mainly to the US. Similar percentages of automobiles and consumer durables was also shipped there. The US production of steel and automobiles collapsed under the impact of japanese competition; indeed, the decline of the American Rust Belt was the counterpart to Japan's Economic Miracle.
Basically, as the japanese industrialization got up to speed, the benefits of catching up with already developed technology and with lower wages and costs it outcompeted the US industries, and was partly possible because of the US policy of not shielding it's industries with protective tarrifs.
hi! I'm going to take a guess that you're asking about cities like Detroit, yes? If so, you might be interested in this thread. It also contains links to several more, all of which are related to urban collapse / deurbanization & "white flight".
Containerization of international shipping achieved standard dimensions around the early 1970s. This dramatically reduced the cost of a globalized supply chain. Outside the U.S., wages for unskilled workers were lower, and the combination of globalized supply chains and low wages made it optimal to manufacture simple goods with high labor inputs overseas and import them. This suggests a hypothesis that the labor-intensive manufacturing went elsewhere as it became cheap enough, while the capital-intensive work stayed and automated out its employees.
The U.S. has never really "lost" its industrial production capabilities; when one looks at charts measuring this capability over time(for example, INDPRO), there is a continued upward trend. This article argues that it's a loss in employment that has created the perception of deindustrialization, which fits with my hypothesis.
The most detailed treatment I'm aware of on containerization is: Levinson, Marc (2006). The Box: How the Shipping Container Made the World Smaller and the World Economy Bigger.
Last note: I wouldn't call containerization and automation the sole reasons; one could also point to changes in financing, regulation, etc. But the biggest visible "lever of power" is in the ability for companies to break away from the demands of local labor markets by growing into globalized entities.
It didn't help that heavy industry in the US failed to modernize after WWII while in Europe and Japan it was destroyed during the war and then rebuilt using the most modern technology, which was often shared by the US for political reasons. Instead in the US for example the steel industry invested its huge profits in buying labor peace with high wages and guaranteed employment rather than mechanizing the production process. By the time the energy crisis hit oversized and unproductive workforces hurt profits that were being squeezed by energy prices and foreign competition and unions preferred strikes to realistic compromises that would preserve some members' jobs.
Source: grew up in Pittsburgh, grandfather was a metallurgist for a small specialty steelmaker that managed to survive and he took many trips abroad to help Germans, Poles and Koreans set up their steel industries.