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Subscribe to RSSA new study of manufacturing employment by the Investigative Reporting Workshop at American University shows that factory jobs declined by nearly half since the peak in 1979, when there were 21 million manufacturing workers.
But the researchers also found that manufacturing employment grew in some states, all of them west of the Mississippi River. And many communities, such as York, Pa., still see manufacturing as integral to their survival.
The study is part of a year-long project to revisit the 1991 classic work of investigative reporting, "America: What Went Wrong," by the reporting team of Donald Barlett and James Steele. Over the next year, the project team will examine how public policy has shaped America's economic crisis.
The study of manufacturing data found that some states have lost much more than others. In New York, manufacturing jobs are down by three-fourths, in Pennsylvania by two-thirds. The story examines attempts to revive manufacturing, as well as a shift to more high-tech, high-skilled jobs.
An interesting interactive map shows state-by-state, year-by-year shifts in manufacturing employment.
Here are the links:
- Home page for the series
- Interactive map showing changes in manufacturing jobs
- Additional maps showing manufacturing jobs in each state
Leave a Comment:
Why am I not surprised, when President Obama's Job czar Jeff Immelt CEO and tax evader of GE is sending his jobs and company to China.
car
WOW! Did you even go look at the map they are talking about? Last year was the 1st positive growth in manufacturing jobs since clinton was in office.
How a bout a map showing the jobs being occupied by illegal immigrants? including the million that Obama just promised to hand to them.
flnobody, that may be but remember that during first 94% of the Bush years, the unemployment rate was at, slightly above or slightly below 5%, not far from the government definition of full employment, (full employment is not 0%, it is around 3 or 4% according to Uncle Sam). My point being there just wasn't that much room for improvement in the unemployment rate. Also few people remember that Bush inherited a recession from Clinton, which was promptly exasperated by 9/11. The main difference is Bush didn't blame everything on Clinton, unlike the little puke in the Whitehouse now.
ignorant jerk!
hard
2002 range was 5.7% to 6%
2003 range was 5.7% to 6.3%
It was 4% when bush got into office. It was 7.8% when he got out. A 3.8% increase. From when obama go in, to the highest it went was a 2.2% change.
http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS14000000
I think that it's amazing how someone on the right. Will say that bush inherited a recession from clinton. Despite it starting after bush got into office. But blame obama for the housing market, unemployment and the economy from the day he got into office. That went into a free fall before in got in office. And bush had a congress and a senate that pretty much gave him everything he wanted. Compared to what we have now.
Most Favored Nation (MFN) status was granted to Communist China in 1979 and has been renewed on a yearly basis ever since and made permanent as Permanent Normal Trade Relations (PNTR) status in 2000. MFN/PNTR allows the Chinese access to U.S. markets at tariff rates that average six percent. Nations without the designation face a forty-four percent tariff. The Republicans spearheaded these actions for the sake of their corporate and U.S. Chamber of Commerce benefactors with the
help of some Democrats.
The U.S. market is flooded with toys, shoes and gadgets manufactured by cheap Chinese labor. Scores of U.S. companies moved their manufacturing operations to China and exporting the finished product back to the U.S. (apfn.org) This was made possible by drastically reducing tariffs. Tariffs that protected the American workers/middle-class from cheap/slave labor in China and the Third World for years and made the U.S. a global and military super power.
Presidents and congressmen and congresswomen of both parties voted to pass several trade agreements. Ross Perot tried to warn Americans about what would happen if NAFTA was signed. It ushered in the expansion of the global economy at the expense of the middle class in America. After wages relatively stagnating for three decades, we are reaching a tipping point where repatriating some of the lost manufacturing jobs is feasible. Politicians must pass favorable terms for manufacturing companies to repatriate jobs here in the US. The bureaucratic red tape needs to be streamlined to allow this repatriation of manufacturing jobs without environmentalistic stalling tactics. It's all about jobs.
How about a map showing American jobs taken by imported Chinese labor.
flnobody Did you ever check out Jeff Immelt?
car
You mean the article about ge moving four (4) supervisors to china?
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-07-25/ge-healthcare-moves-x-ray-base-to-china-no-job-cuts-planned.html
The reason Immelt is in there is because he IS one of the guys that should know how to stop the flow of jobs out of the country. (not sure why we haven't heard more from him)
hardtostarboard,
if we had not been building a bubble, Bushes unemployment numbers would have been much higher !!!
HAte to bust some bubbles here..but the biggest loss of jobs came under presient Bush and the republican party..and cuts in taxes that helped those companies take 600k in jobs elsewhere.Granted, our ecoonomy is not growing as fast as we would all like to see..but then..we have a hugely divided congress that is more concerned with beating Obama than doing the work they were all elected to do for this country. Wake up folks, Obama does not write the bills that congress passes...he can make suggestions as to what needs to be done but it is congress that has done nothing...and the republicans have been the worst of the lot in that respect..however, there are many on the democratic side that are no better..they all should go.
if we had not been building a bubble, Bushes unemployment numbers would have been much higher !!!
Wow Corp....., you figured that out all on your own. Kind of like saying if we had not had the computer revolution, Clintons unemployment numbers would have been much higher!!!
Immelt has done nothing illegal. He is a smart businessman.
The next two bubbles that will burst in the future is the US dollar and US treasuries.
wow starboard, it's kinda like saying Bushes numbers are BS !!!!
flnobody
HA HA..no small coincidence from MSNBS
This is right wing propaganda.
The president, himself, recently said that the private sector is doing just fine.
I truly hope you are being sarcastic. The private sector is not doing fine, and the president is in way over his head.
Our dear leader said the private sector is fine, how dare you disagree with him, you must be a racist homophobe.
Actually , the President is some what correct. The private sector will show minor job growth.
The Public sector will hemorrhage jobs dramatically. Further slowing the private.
Still not a great situation. Neither could be reasonably defined as "fine". I think he corrected it? Not Sure.
Our countries economy is in way over its head and our corrupt, and now rich, politicians put us there.
I can't imagine why?
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/40565987/ns/business-going_green/t/wind-their-backs-powerful-democrats-help-chinese-energy-firm-chase-stimulus-money/
WHAT?? york,pa has manufacturing jobs....i live there and i'd sure like to know where they are.we have lost so many companies in the last 15yrs...catapiller,cole steel,american chain,motter printing,a few major warehouse companies...bring some work here...we have alot of vacant buildings...also alot of vacant stores in the malls or strip malls.the only major company is harley and who knows for how long...flawed study at best.
Statistic lie, and government statistics are the best liars.
Never mind that currently 50% of Americans do not make enough money to pay any taxes, our unemployment rate is gowing down and things are getting better. Things are better today then they ever have been before, unemployment is done from 9.5% to 8.5%. We just need more NAFTA, more Free Trade agreements, more of that giant sucking sound, as H. Ross Perot called it.
We don't need high paying manufacturing jobs for lazy scumbags, we don't need export products. All those low paying jobs in the service industry, McDonalds and Walmart, are going to Restore Our Future. The American Dream is still alive, it's just not a reality anymore.
Now lets promise a "Dream Act" to illegal aliens, they should fall for it just as well as Americans fell for the dream destroying NAFTA.
"I can dream about it, if I don't hold it to tight. I can dream about it, though I can't have it allright."
CPO Sharkey: Have you noted the NAFTA clones passed by congress. That and attacking the Constitution, seems to be the only things they can do together.
Ross Perot was SO CORRECT on so many issues. We need a candidate like him now.
You have a candidate like Ross Perot. His name is Ron Paul and the main stream media has convinced America he is crazy.
So many of these arguments on here miss what lay at the foundation of all these problems. It isn't republicans and it isn't democrats. They are one in the same. Why did they have no problem passing the NDAA together, but they can't cut a penny from the budget? They can pass a mandatory health insurance law, but can't find a way to cut a penny from the 800 billion spent annually on medicare, the 700 billion spent annually on defense (that is actually in a budget, more than a trillion goes out in non budgeted allocations).
Republicans and democrats together manage to spend trillions that are not even accounted for and americans take the bait by fighting about which one of them is holy and which is evil.
THEY'RE BOTH THE SAME....they just pay off different people. Republicans support corporate welfare, low taxes for the wealthy and open trade, Democrat support social welfare, low taxes for the rich (those tax breaks never went away), and open borders. The only difference is a Republican will send our jobs to Mexico, a Democrat will let Mexican workers cross the borders into the US.
Worst years in manufacuring jobs data:
1975: -1,757,000
1982: -1,268,000
1990: -1,519,000
2002: -1,179,000
2009: -1,585,000
Clearly this is Obama's fault. All of Bush's 8 years as president saw job losses in the manufacturing sector.
It's almost like economic cycles have absolutely nothing to do with what party has the presidency.
And yet over a similar time period more jobs were created than the number of workers available for jobs. This implies that manufacturing jobs were replaced by something else. What were they replaced by?
Bob - "2009: -1,585,000"
Yes, Obama was president in 2009 - the second worst manufacturing loss ever, by your own admission.... and thats even ON TOP OF 8 years of prior losses as you claim.
pj
why didn't you show 2010 and 2011? Doesn't meet the right wing thinking of yours?
billybob
And yet the unemployment rate went up. You have something to back up your statement?
Obama took office in January 2009. As there is a lag in economy related to policy, this can be laid at the feet of Bush or the 2007 recession, whichever way your partisan politics swing.
"And yet the unemployment rate went up. You have something to back up your statement?" -flnobody
Care to cite your sources? From BLS data, I get that unemployment has gone down since Obama took office (bls.gov).
One little fact that often gets overlooked in discussing these manu. jobs is that bushco was getting creamed so severely on this metric that after 2 or 3 years, they changed the system to include restaurant jobs as manufacturing. And even with that, he still kept losing jobs. So, if you can't change reality into something positive, just change people's perception, right? Bushco was all about smoke and mirrors. One of my many disappointments in President Obama is his failure to roll back some of these silly things like that. That one change skewed the numbers drastically. It is now very difficult to compare manufacturing under Clinton to manufacturing under bush or Obama. It's really a shame that our "leaders" are so allergic to reality. I have a hard time thinking of someone cooking my hamburger as manufacturing. What a joke.
Speaking of smoke and mirrors, who had control of congress during that time?
bush and the GOP. But that doesn't matter. That is an executive decision.
bob
Here:
http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS14000000
If you can't read for yourself. Just ask any three years old to do it for you.
The TeaPartiers KNOW that it takes less time to float a ship that has sunk than it did to sink it, even with less money & people !
Thanks, flnobody, for proving my point. Bush was president until January 2009. Ask any three "years" old, they can tell you.
Sorry, flnobody, thought you were talking to me.
Bob
No problem, @!$%# happens. ®¿®
That's actually a very nice link Flnobody, thanks.
This is good, right? Manufacturers send jobs overseas to reduce the cost of manufacturing that gets passed on to the consumer (and stockholder). So what if there are less Americans who can afford even basic necessities. As long as the American board, executives, and stockholders make more money, it is a win!
I agree with MSpielman - Economic Cycles. As the world economy becomes more global these cycles will turn faster. Unfortunaltely we Americans will have to accept that no one is on top forever.
9 deleted, kathy-3035103 flaming 'you trashy white people'.
You're suspended for a day for violating #1 of the Code of Honor.
It cannot be a coincidence, read on:
Economic superiority is only attainable by having a strong manufacturing base and a prerequisite to military superiority. The U.S. Congress, the White House, Corporate America and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce
gave away the country's advantage in technology and manufacturing know-how with dual applications, commercial and military, to China.
Most Favored Nation (MFN) status was granted to Communist China in 1979 and has been renewed on a yearly basis ever since and made permanent as Permanent Normal Trade Relations (PNTR) status in 2000. MFN/PNTR allows the Chinese access to U.S. markets at tariff rates that average six percent. Nations without the designation face a forty-four percent tariff. The Republicans spearheaded these actions for the sake of their corporate and U.S. Chamber of Commerce benefactors with the help of some Democrats.
More than just granting Red China an open door to the U.S. market, the American political establishment has implemented a Chinese "Marshall Plan". The Chinese economy is growing by leaps and bounds at the expense
of the American workers/middle-class. It is hard to shop at many U.S. stores and buy something that is not made in China. The U.S. market is flooded with toys, shoes and gadgets manufactured by cheap Chinese
labor. Scores of U.S. companies moved their manufacturing operations to China and exporting the finished product back to the U.S. (apfn.org) This was made possible by drastically reducing tariffs. Tariffs that protected the American workers/middle-class from cheap/slave labor in China and the Third World for years and made the U.S. a global and military super power. The U.S.A. pretty much funded the rise of the Chinese military and that resulted in the demise of its own.
This action by the U.S. Congress and the White House drastically increased unemployment and reduced the import tax revenue, reduced individual and business tax base drastically increasing the budget deficit in
the trillions of dollars at the Federal, State and Local levels. It also under-funded Social Security and Medicare. Now we have to reduce the military budget, increase tuition, lay-off teachers, cancel summer school, etc. due to lack of funds while China is on the way to becoming the economic and military super power of the globe
replacing the U.S.A.
We should all demand that the U.S. Congress and the White House repeal China's PNTR. This should be the major issue in the presidential election. They keep saying they will create jobs but don't have any explanation on how they will do it. They just keep doing the same failed solution, tax cuts.
TO PRESIDENT OBAMA, GOV. ROMNEY AND THE U.S. CONGRESS: REPEAL CHINA'S PNTR STATUS NOW.
Thats the sad thing about this election IndVoter. You have two pretty much similar choices.
Romney is Right LITE, and Obama is Left LITE.
The actual trade policy differences are minimal at best. And , It goes beyond trade..........
@Scar--you are correct. When it comes to trade agreements, there really hasn't been any difference between parties for quite some time. I voted for Ross Perot. He was the only one in those presidential debates that was against NAFTA. If he had been elected, this would be a vastly different country with at least 3 major political parties.
@IndVoter--neither party is going to repeal China's PNTR status. You always negotiate from a position of strength. Believe me, we are not negotiating from a position of strength right now.
Yup, and when you go into that voting booth this November and flip a coin over which candidate to vote for, it will be, "heads, China wins", and "tails, America loses".
Great choice we have.
Please Republicans, you can't spin this article in your favor. With all the help of Bush, the elite and corporations have destroyed this county's manufacturing jobs.
whatthefhappened
How quickly you forget that Bush had a democratically controlled Congress that was right there helping him along.
But the again, all you democrats don't have the courage to admit it, and that your Obama is a failed leader, but you don't have to; Obama's own words are doing it for you. I think this is the first time a standing Presidents own words condemn him as a failed leader.
The only Obama campaign policy that is working; self, open mouth, put foot in it.
Try posting some facts instead of rhetoric, what happened. I don't think you can. Prove that he is a failed leader. Your turn...
The simple truth is you can't sustain an economy on services jobs. I think that has proved out to be fact. You have to have manufacturing to produce product that can be sold in country and exported to rasie the capital for the economic growth you need to sustain an economy.
To blame one President or one party for the economic mess this country is in is moronic as too many years the decline in manufacturing has occurred. But you can blame the Presidents like Obama who haven't the leadership skills or the guts to change things.
I think after 40 plus years the lesson has been taught that in order for this country to recover, we will need manufacturing to develop quickly and it just isn't going to happen under Obama.
Don't worry people the president says the private sector is doing just fine.
BTW: what went wrong is the unions caused the plants to move to Right-to-Work states, NAFTA didn't help also.
Actually Shawn , if the unions caused the plants to move to right to work states.
How you explain the big manufacturing loss numbers on those southern states?? Textiles & Furniture alone??
By the way, I believe the south will be getting more Japanese & Korean plants as the Chinese empire grows.
Yes textile and furniture manufacturing is gone in the south but many car plants have opened there, GM closed the only plant left in CA and moved it to TX. We still produce a lot of the cotton and export it.
Are you people even looking at the map??? Virginia, New Jersey,,,,,,,There are only
about 6 States actually showing jobs lost, ALL of the rest show major job gains!!!
Not to mention for those who are blaming the few who are losing job on Obama
They each have,,,,A Republican Governor, LOL
I can't speak for everyone. But I'm looking at the trend line from 1970 -2011
I'm not just looking at 2010- 2011. And neither should you.
For whole industries died in the 1970- 2011 period. Textiles as a random example.
Neither party has a plan to move that line upwards.
Define "major job gains" for all of us who have been affected by unemployment. I don't consider a job something that any kid in high school can earn more than an experienced adult at. I don't consider a commission only situation as a job. I don't consider companies only offering part time hours and employment as true jobs. One has to be generating sufficient to at least pay your routine obligations without having to work three separate part time jobs and still come up with 2/3 of what you used to earn at one full time job....Remember, quality is more important than quantity when it comes to making things work again.
Bo
The only jobs Obama has been able to create are in Afghan, Pakistan and Egypt with the tons of money he is borrowing and dumping into those countries.
We need manufacturing jobs in this country. This is were Obama has failed. But what else can you expect from someone who denounces his own leadership skills as those of a failed leader.
Could you point out to me where Romney is going to dramatically cut foreign aid?? I would support that.
Here's a start: http://www.mittromney.com/collection/foreign-policy
I see where he's going to enlarge the military with money we do not have. But I do not see where he is going to stop payments to people worldwide that hate us.
The differences between them is minor.
First off the Presidency does not create jobs never has never will, they set the mood with solid decisions , Middle class create jobs when Middle class is doing good they spend money which drives demands for job growth, take that money out of the middle class and here we are today, Obama had nothing to do with it, Previous Presidents set bad situations that caused the Housing bust, unregulated banks and just plain bad decisions
I'd love to see how many manufacturing jobs were added in China/offshore, during the same period, making goods sold in the US. Can the author of this article (Bill Dedman) continue this research?
I think the tide needs to change for all countries, If china wants to sell goods here they must manufacturer them here, If ford wants to build a car in China for the China market that's fine but you cant import them to America Get the drift? Jaguar wants to sell a car here they have to be built here, We want to sell pots and pans there then we build a plant there and use local people, cut the import export down. This would help the so called Global economy
Now does everyone realize why we are in such a mess? Why wages are stagnant? Why we owe 13 trillion dollars? We were sold this load of crap by both parties and by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. No nation can make it by selling hamburgers and financial management. You have to produce your way to prosperity. Get rid of the whole bunch and put Americans back to work.
When American companies started closing down their plants here in the US they started a downward spiral that by now is almost impossible to fix. They were responsible for the death of some small towns. They became responsible for a large amount of unemployment in order to take their manufacturing plants to 3rd world countries where they didn't have to pay benefits, paid minimul salaries, and did it all to fatten their own wallets. There should have been some sort of tax penalties and fines to discourage companies from taking jobs away from America.
How can it be fixed now? Say they bring jobs back here. They'll have to pay decent salaries, some form of benefits, workman's comp, maybe even have union workers. Not to mention having working conditions that are acceptable by our countries standards. Who pays for all that but consumers?
I can't see a way for this to all be reversed, not when it's gone on for so long. This country grew to the power it once was on the backs of it's work force. Made in America was once said with pride and meant quality.
Manufacturing will stay in China for many reasons:
1. The article states that in 1979, the US reached it's peak with 21 million manufacturing workers. The province of Guangzhou alone has more than that. In a numbers game, the Chines will always potentially have 5 times the workers than we do. Probably more since the emphasis of there workforce is manufacturing, not millions of jobs such as paper pushers, redundant government jobs, lawyers (nothing against lawyers, we just have far too many here in the states), etc.
2. China's economy does not have the same dramatic inflationary cycle as we do. Their wages remain low as the cost of living does not increase at the same rate as ours.
3. Even though many Chinese factories are run down, they still have a larger quantity of modern factories than we do.
4. Chinese factory workers are more educated than U.S. factory workers, meaning more efficiency.
5. The Chinese do not have unions adding to the companies expenses.
6. Mot manufacturing from China is everyday items. Most manufacturing in the U.S. is military materials. The U.S. is still the number one nation in terms of exports, but if you remove the military items, China and Germany are ahead.
If this were so then why a jobs flowing back to the US? If there is no inflation, thenwhy a Chinese wages going up the23%. MOst Chises workers a fresshfrom the courtyside-and theydon't have great skills; theydo work for 56 cents and hour.
Japan has mcu more educatedworkers the China and so do Sigapore and Twian. The Chinese areinjust begining their verious of Industria lpolicy-targeting Solr Palnels theway the Japanese targeted Semicondutors inthe 1980's.
Meanwhile the US in whip sawed by Cinese dumping of Solar panels-as both Romney and Obama can testify.
SOME jobs are coming back to the U.S. I am only pointing out that their population is 5 times greater than ours. Using simple math, you can see that they have quite an advantage in that respect.
There inflationary cycle is much slower than ours. Therefore, the 23% wage increase is causing there middle class to live very well.
Those coming from the country side with less skills work in the factories requiring less skills, there are still plenty with high er skills available.
Don't underestimate the education level in China. Again, even if the Japanese and Singaporeans ARE better educated, there are still a billion more Chinese than those combined.
How about the "Great Sucking Sound" that Ross Perot warned us about in 1992, with jobs going to Mexico with NAFTA? How about China-Walmart, outsourcing, H1-B visas for computer programmers. Its all a bunch of crap conducted by the elites above, whether they come with an R or a D after their name. Its all about pushing wages as low as you can, even if it means Third World Slave labor.
The only thing the American Civil war did was abolish slavery in name for blacks, and enable it in reality for EVERYONE. A major concession the unions eventually got was the right to be paid in American money instead of company credits that could only be used at the company store. (replace the agrarian slave system of the South with the industrial slave wage system of the North)
The elites and their "house n**gers" (sorry the only fitting term) who think they are better than the rest of us "field n**gers" like to blame the little guy, when the truth is whether it is a civilian leader or a general, the leader needs to take into account the strengths, weaknesses and behavior of the followers.
If a general knows most of his army can't swim and he curses his army for losing the battle after forcing them to cross a river, it is the general's fault and not his men's fault. So it is with the financial crisis, with people doing stupid stuff like buying stuff it turns out they couldn't afford after being talked into it by con artists working on commission. Its the people up to who are responsible.
Well, it is large corporations who moved the manufacturing bases to China to increase profits, and the American public who refused to support American industry and workers by continually buying the cheapest goods available. The unions and labor in general should have supported and pushed for import restrictions years ago. Just too late now.
Check the stats, kiddies. Jobs created/lost under
Reagan 1,3778,000 lost
Bush I: 2,394,000 lost
Clinton: 543,000 created
Bush II: 3,652,000 lost
Obama: 1,691,000 lost
Carter: 2,719,000 created
The interactivemaps are worth their wight ingold intelling the story year by year, making sure this is not a fy bynight problem-instead in is a muchmore insidious one. But more neds to be done: for example the relationship between tax policy and manufacturing has yet to be know, and also the impact of foregn trade and especially NAFTA.
No oneh s talked about the NAFTA reverse: Mexica immrigrants coming North because NAFTA caused a mass migration of poeple moving to cities because cheaper Aerican corn wiped out Mexican agricultre making it profitless by under cutting prices paid farmers. This set thestage for todays immigration debtes..
No one has mention is role for car manfacturers setting up in right to work states who also under cut the wage base-meaning if one has a job is doesn't ayenough andcontributes to a downward wage siprial that contiiues tohiss day..
There are other rories yet unwirtten.
The U.S. continues to have the largest manufacturing output in the world, ahead of China. The U.S. still accounted for 20 percent of the world’s manufacturing output in 2009, only slightly below its 1990 share of 21 percent, little changed in 20 years. It may take fewer workers to produce that output, but you can blame that on automation and the information technology revolution, not outsourcing of jobs.
We had a full employment economy in both 2006 & 2007 with an unemployment rate of just 4.6%. It doesn't get any better than that.