Who Wants to Work On an Assembly Line?
13 August 2006
Editor, The Washington Post
1150 15th St., NW
Washington, DC 20071
Dear Editor:
Karl von Schriltz is distressed that America has three million fewer manufacturing jobs today than in 2000 (Letters, August 13). He should relax. Eighty percent of America's economy now is in the service sector - the sector with the best jobs.
In an economic unit smaller than the US economy - the family - applause rather than distress typically greets the "loss" of manufacturing jobs. For example, my parents are delighted that I work in the service sector, as a college professor, rather than in the manufacturing sector (shipbuilding) that employed my father and grandfather. I'm delighted, too. If almost everyone aspires, for themselves and for their children, to work in service-sector jobs such as physician, lawyer, architect, journalist, and educator, why should we lament an economy that increasingly allows us to fulfill this aspiration?
Sincerely,
Donald J. Boudreaux
Chairman, Department of Economics
George Mason University
Editor, The Washington Post
1150 15th St., NW
Washington, DC 20071
Dear Editor:
Karl von Schriltz is distressed that America has three million fewer manufacturing jobs today than in 2000 (Letters, August 13). He should relax. Eighty percent of America's economy now is in the service sector - the sector with the best jobs.
In an economic unit smaller than the US economy - the family - applause rather than distress typically greets the "loss" of manufacturing jobs. For example, my parents are delighted that I work in the service sector, as a college professor, rather than in the manufacturing sector (shipbuilding) that employed my father and grandfather. I'm delighted, too. If almost everyone aspires, for themselves and for their children, to work in service-sector jobs such as physician, lawyer, architect, journalist, and educator, why should we lament an economy that increasingly allows us to fulfill this aspiration?
Sincerely,
Donald J. Boudreaux
Chairman, Department of Economics
George Mason University
Posted by Don Boudreaux on
Thursday May 3, 2007 at 11:02am