"For the first time since data has been kept, manufacturing is less than 10 percent of employment."

[swag]

Economist Dean Baker writes from the Center for Economic and Policy Research:

The loss of manufacturing jobs continues the downward trend of the last decade. Manufacturing employment has fallen by 3,880,000 jobs, or 22.0 percent, since January of 1998. It lost 279,000 jobs in the last year. The newly revised data show that employment in manufacturing fell below 10.0 percent of total employment in October. The loss of jobs has hit every sector of manufacturing, although the auto sector has been especially hard hit, losing 57,400 jobs or 5.6 percent of employment in the last year. The loss of 18,300 jobs in textile mills and 20,300 in apparel (10.1 and 9.1 percent of employment, respectively) also stand out.

. . .

This employment report should be sufficient to remove any doubt that the economy is in very serious trouble and most likely has already entered a downturn. In addition to the loss of jobs, there was also a reported decline of 0.1 hours in the average workweek, leading to a decline of 0.3 in the index of aggregate weekly hours. The decline in hours worked, which showed up most clearly in non-durable manufacturing, suggest that more layoffs are on the way. In addition, wage growth has slowed to crawl, averaging just 2.3 percent over the last quarter. This is well below the rate of inflation.

It is also important to remember that the birth/death imputation is likely overstating the number of jobs created in new firms. The revision for last year lowered total employment by 376,000 or 31,000 per month. It is likely that the current data will be revised downward by a comparable amount. In short, the picture is probably even worse than the data now show.

via Economist's View

[MannyGoldstein]

1. Grammer-Cop Time

Should be "for the first time since data have been kept,"

[swag]

3. You are correct in a prescriptive grammarian sense with which I sympathize,

but I am not the author or editor.

[WinkyDink]

4. Spelling-Cop time: Grammar.

[RUMMYisFROSTED]

19. Happens every time.

Plus, I believe there is no hyphen in "Spelling Cop." However, the rules for hyphens are often subjective.

I'm sure I've also fucked this post up somehow, too.

[Donk Yore]

2. Sad and very clear news with obvious implications. n/t

[bettyellen]

5. don't i know it.

yes indeed i do.
we used to have quite a few factories in my town, i miss them.

[swag]

9. Your town is a fantastic place to be,

but I'm sorry I didn't get to see it with all those building bustling, and the industry in full bloom.

I hope very much to come back soon.

[bettyellen]

17. yeah, they are all condos now.

whenever you can find an excuse to come back, you'll be most welcome.
did you get your own kitty yet?

[Fredda Weinberg]

6. You're not going to reverse globalization

In my area:

Creative industries such as new media, advertising, fashion, design and architecture account for a growing share of employment, with New York City possessing a strong competitive advantage in these industries.<11> High-tech industries like bioscience, software development, game design, and Internet services are also growing, bolstered by the city's position at the terminus of several transatlantic fiber optic trunk lines.<12> Other important sectors include medical research and technology, non-profit institutions, and universities.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economy_of_New_York_City

[FogerRox]

15. Globalism has been reversed everytime its gets a toe hold over 400 years

Globalism has consistently failed every time.

[EstimatedProphet]

7. So is the largest industry the service industry?

Did they finally get what they wanted under St. Ronnie? Are we now a nation of waiters?

[ThoughtCriminal]

8. Remember when the WH wanted to count fast food...

as "Manufacturing"?

http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9D02EFDC113DF933A15751C0A9629C8B63
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2004/02/20/politics/main601336.shtml

[Coyote_Bandit]

10. And here I am

trying to learn a trade/craft so that I can work for myself offering tangible custom products in a small niche market segment. So am I behind the curve? Ahead of the curve? A contrarian? Or just desperate?

Very sad what has happened to the manufacturing sector of our economy. The fact that it has not been treated as a national defense issue suggests that if our country were to become involved in a real prolonged war we would get our collective ass kicked. Hell, we couldn't even manufacture socks and skivvies for our troops.

[madrchsod]

11. it takes 7-10 years to master a sock making machine

there are a few plants in the usa and canada but once they are gone there will be no one left that knows how to run those machines

[knitter4democracy]

18. Less than that to hand-knit them.

Still, our way takes longer and uses more expensive materials.

You know, my dad says the same thing about machinists--how we're losing them and therefore losing the ability to make things.

[water]

12. Not necessarily a bad thing, actually.

[smoogatz]

13. It's a terrible thing.

Without a productive manufacturing base, we're destined to become an economic colony to China. Oh, wait--we already are.

[KillCapitalism]

14. Yeah it's like the WW2 vet that said this.

He said that if we had to fight a war like WW2 again, that we would not be able to do it b/c we lack the manufacturing power we had back then.

I wonder if China ever invades whether or not they will still sell us the bullets to kill them with?

[TexasObserver]

16. Loss of manufacturing jobs has undercut blue collar America.

Free Market my ass! We subsidize our demise by letting companies freely outsource. What good does it do to have health and safety standards we impose on our own manufacturers, then allow goods from countries that lack any such standards?

Show me a free market advocate, and I'll show you someone who can't lose their job to outsourcing.

[knitter4democracy]

20. What I wonder is this: what about war?

I'm serious. What if we were attacked or at least cut off. It wouldn't be impossible to cut off American ports in a war. How would we survive? I know we're crafty, wiley people, but with such a huge loss in manufacturing, how would we provide for ourselves? Shouldn't part of Homeland Security be making sure we really are secure? That we can make our own cloth, steel, war machines, soap, whatever without having to go overseas to do it? That just makes sense to me.

[sarcasmo]

21. We make nothing yet buy, buy, buy. The downfall of this nation.