Are Good Jobs Flying Away?

Aerospace, once the "crown jewel" of American manufacturing, is experiencing a structural decline characterized by a narrowing of the industry trade surplus, an increase in the foreign content of commercial aircraft and engines, a greater role for foreign companies in research and development, and a loss of "good jobs." Employment in aircraft engine manufacturing peaked in 1988 at over 141,000 employees and plummeted to just over 76,000 in 1995. Beth Almeida, of the Center for Industrial Competitiveness at the University of Massachusetts Lowell and the Department of Economics at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, examines the decline of the aircraft industry and attributes the slipping competitive advantage of the United States to the failure of American firms to extend organizational learning to the shop floor.