Low-Skill Employment and the Changing Economy of Rural America
by
Robert Gibbs,
Lorin Kusmin, and
John Cromartie
Economic Research Report No. (ERR-10) 38 pp, October 2005
Cover Image for ERR10
This study reports trends in rural low-skill employment in the 1990s and their impact on the rural workforce. The share of rural jobs classified as low-skill fell by 2.2 percentage points between 1990 and 2000, twice the decline of the urban low-skill employment share, but much less than the decline of the 1980s. Employment shifts from low-skill to skilled occupations within industries, rather than changes in industry mix, explain virtually all of the decline in the rural low-skill employment share. The share decline was particularly large for rural Black women, many of whom moved out of low-skill blue-collar work into service occupations, while the share of rural Hispanics who held low-skill jobs increased.
Keywords: rural labor markets, low-skill employment, job skills, human capital, industry, occupation, economic development
In this publication...
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Report summary, Pdf file 91 kb | HTML
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Abstract, Acknowledgments, Contents, and Summary, Pdf file 75 kb
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Introduction, Pdf file 44 kb
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Data and Methods, Pdf file 44 kb
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Rural America and the Prevalence of Low-Skill Employment, Pdf file 51 kb
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Rural Low-Skill Employment Declines Outpace the Nation’s, Pdf file 79 kb
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Structural Factors Driving Rural Low-Skill Employment Trends in the 1990s, Pdf file 133 kb
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How Rural Low-Skill Change in the 1990s Compares with the 1980s, Pdf file 49 kb
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Implications of Low-Skill Employment Trends for Rural Workers, Pdf file 70 kb
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Conclusions, Pdf file 44 kb
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References, Pdf file 43 kb
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Appendix, Pdf file 80 kb
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Entire Document, Pdf file 464 kb
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