Manufacturing Jobs Have Recovered, But Not Everywhere

Manufacturing Jobs Have Recovered, But Not Everywhere

For the first time since the 1970s, the sector has regained all the jobs it lost in a recession.

August Benzow and Connor O’Brien, Economic Innovation Group

Oct 9, 2024 iStock.com/DSCimage Manufacturing employment in the U.S. has surpassed its pre-pandemic levels, the first time since the 1970s that the sector has regained all the jobs it lost in a recession. Yet its recovery lags behind job growth in other sectors of the economy and masks large regional disparities.In nearly half of the country’s states — and fully half of all counties — manufacturing employment has not yet rebounded to 2019 levels. […]

The Great Inversion

The Great Inversion

The quickly settled International Longshoremen’s Association strike takes us one more step toward the Great Inversion: a future in which people in the skilled and semi-skilled trades boast higher average wages than most college graduates. If the justification for most college degrees—only 10 percent of them in STEM fields—reduces to their boosting future earning power, then those graduates will have a problem. (Granted: a college education should be about more than just maximizing earnings.)

It has escaped no one’s attention that the settlement with the longshoremen’s union will bump up annual starting salaries to about $80,000, with mid-career salaries over […]

Unions Need to Join the 21st Century Economy

Unions Need to Join the 21st Century Economy

The old union model, built around protecting jobs, is less valuable to a modern workforce more open to change.

It is hard to be “the most pro-union president in American history,” as Joe Biden likes to claim , while also leading an effort to “reimagine and rebuild a new economy,” as he has also promised. That’s because these goals are fundamentally incompatible: America’s unions no longer fit the modern economy.

In fact, in many ways unions actually prevent the economy from evolving. The recently ended International Longshoremen’s Association strike is an illustration. The dockworkers went back to work after getting […]

New technologies drive job creation despite economic headwinds

New technologies drive job creation despite economic headwinds

Technological advancements have created an estimated net 600,000 jobs in Southeast Asia over the past five years, according to the World Bank’s latest East Asia and Pacific Economic Update.

The report, released during an online conference on Tuesday, reveals that despite concerns over automation-related job losses, the adoption of industrial robots and artificial intelligence (AI) has led to unexpected employment growth in the region. "Between 2018 and 2022, the integration of robotics into manufacturing processes generated approximately 2 million skilled positions in formal employment sectors," said World Bank East Asia and Pacific chief economist Aaditya Mattoo . "While this […]

Manufacturing jobs have recovered, but not everywhere

Manufacturing jobs have recovered, but not everywhere

Manufacturing employment has rebounded nationally, but growth is concentrated in the Sun Belt and Mountain West, while the Rust Belt continues to rust.

By August Benzow and Connor O’Brien

Manufacturing employment in the United States has surpassed its pre-pandemic levels, the first time since the 1970s that the sector has regained all the jobs it lost in a recession. Yet its recovery lags behind job growth in other sectors of the economy and masks large regional disparities.In nearly half of the country’s states — and fully half of all counties — manufacturing employment has not yet rebounded to 2019 […]

Short-lived strike puts focus on how dockworkers’ labor keeps economy, supply chain rolling

Short-lived strike puts focus on how dockworkers’ labor keeps economy, supply chain rolling

Port workers from the International Longshoremen’s Association participate in a strike at the Virginia International Gateway in Portsmouth Oct. 1, 2024. A compromise was reached Oct. 3 between the International Longshoremen’s Association and the U.S. Maritime Alliance and under a tentative agreement on wages — a 61.5 percent increase over six years — workers returned to the ports until Jan. 15, 2025. (OSV News photo/Jose Luis Gonzalez, Reuters) Some labor strikes can be comfortably ignored by many Americans.

But when an estimated 45,000 dockworkers at 36 East and Gulf Coast ports walked off the job at 12:01 a.m. ET on […]

Crane Consumables plans expansion after years of growth

Crane Consumables plans expansion after years of growth

The Cranes, father-and-son Rod and Robert Crane who helm the business. How many companies have culture offi cers? How many of
those culture offi cers are canine? At Crane Consumables,
three: Charlie Crane, Sherman Crane and Archie Crane.
With tail wags, happy barks and even tricks for treats, the pups take their job very seriously.
The Cranes, father-and-son Rod and Robert Crane who helm the business, credit the pups with brightening faces and enlivening the workspace to support their high employee retention rate amid a nationwide labor crisis: over 50 percent of the workforce has been with the converter for […]

We all must cope with rapidly evolving technologies

We all must cope with rapidly evolving technologies

Advancements in modern technology since the 1970s have been nothing short of amazing. In fact, after January 1, 1983, which is widely regarded as the official birthday of the Internet, the world has not been the same, as mankind has more and more leaned on technology to improve efficiency and make life easier, at least for most people.

It’s not surprising, therefore, that with the leap to the development of artificial intelligence (AI) we are now seeing a real threat to jobs.

This issue, which is both encouraging and troubling, was explored in detail in a Business Observer Special Report […]

Dockworkers join other unions in trying to fend off automation, or minimize impact

Dockworkers join other unions in trying to fend off automation, or minimize impact

The massive port workers’ strike that has shut down all the major dockyards on the Eastern seaboard of the U.S. and the Gulf coast is highlighting a fear held by many workers: Eventually, we will be replaced by machines.

The International Longshoremen’s Association, which represents the approximately 45,000 dock workers who walked off the job Tuesday, is testing whether it’s possible to fight back.

The union is demanding, along with hefty pay raises, a total ban on the automation of gates, cranes and container-moving trucks in its ports. But it’s unclear whether they’ll be able to stave off a trend that […]

Dockworkers Join Other Unions in Trying to Fend off Automation, or Minimize the Impact

NEW YORK (AP) — The massive port workers’ strike that has shut down all the major dockyards on the Eastern seaboard of the U.S. and the Gulf coast is highlighting a fear held by many workers: Eventually, we will be replaced by machines.

The International Longshoremen’s Association, which represents the approximately 45,000 dock workers who walked off the job Tuesday , is testing whether it’s possible to fight back.

The union is demanding, along with hefty pay raises, a total ban on the automation of gates, cranes and container-moving trucks in its ports. But it’s unclear whether they’ll be able to […]