State losing high-pay jobs
Northern Illinois University and other groups plan to release a report today that paints a sad trend of lower-paying jobs overtaking higher-paying ones in Illinois while the state lags the nation in economic growth.
"The State of Working Illinois 2007" is an annual report by NIU's Center for Governmental Studies and the Office for Social Policy Research, as well as the nonprofit Center for Tax and Budget Accountability. It looks at the state of workers by race, ethnic background, wages, industries and other areas and how they compare to the Midwest and the nation.
While Illinois has a growing economy with $507 billion in state gross domestic product in 2006, its 3 percent growth rate has lagged the national average of 3.4 percent, the report said.
"Many workers are getting lower wages and no benefits, about 40 percent don't have health insurance, and half of the workers have absolutely no retirement plans," said Ralph Martire, executive director of the Center for Tax and Budget Accountability in Chicago.
"Our leaders need to focus on economic development to grow high-end jobs, like those in manufacturing and information technology. There's no excuse for losing those jobs here."
While Illinois gained 121,164 workers since 2006, those new jobs involved more lower-paying positions, the report said.
Illinois lost 26 percent of its higher-paying manufacturing jobs over the last 17 years, worse than both the Midwest at 20.8 percent or the nation at 20.9 percent.
By 2007, about 13 percent of the state's workers were employed in manufacturing, compared to professional and business services at 17 percent and education and health services at 15 percent. Manufacturing was only marginally ahead of the retail trade, which was at 12 percent.
Meanwhile, lower-wage service sectors accounted for 30.7 percent of all non-agricultural, private-sector employment, the report said.
State officials disputed the report's findings, saying it was "unbalanced." Mitch Daniels, labor market economist with the Illinois Department of Employment Security, said the report unfairly lumped together all jobs within an industry.
"For example, the report groups together education and health care as low-paying jobs when you really have several high-paying jobs in there. You can't compare the wages of a registered nurse with a CEO and then with a janitor."
Bob Sheets, a policy adviser with the Illinois Department of Commerce and Economic Opportunity, agreed. "The report should have highlighted that Illinois set records for exporting, and we had growth in many of our key sectors," said Sheets. "The report tells only one side of the story."
The report showed several other findings, such as:
• Illinois has added 121,164 workers since 2006. Between 1980 and 2006, whites dropped from 82.3 percent to 70.7 percent of the total work force. Hispanics increased from 4.4 percent to 11.2 percent. Blacks peaked at 13.5 percent in 2000 and have since declined to 12.5 percent. Asians have doubled since 1990, reaching 4 percent by 2006.
• Illinois' work force has become more educated. The share of the work force with a college degree in 2007 was 33.8 percent, higher than both the Midwestern share of 27.8 percent and the national share of 29.5 percent. The share of the work force without a high school degree was 10.9 percent.
• Women make up 64 percent of lower-paying service activities and they break even with men in higher-paying service employment. Almost one-third of all women in the work force are in the education and health services sector, where they make up 73.5 percent of total employees. Women comprise 7.9 percent of workers in construction. Women in manufacturing constitute 27.9 percent, and in transportation and utilities constitute 27.3 percent, which are two higher-paying sectors; however, women represent less than one-third of the workers in either.
• Median hourly wages for women have increased over time, reaching a high of $13.85 in 2006, a gain of $2.22, or 19 percent, since 1980. The differential between the median hourly wages of men and women was $7.26 per hour in 1980, and that dropped to $3.05 in 2006, a 57.9 percent reduction over a 26-year period.
• The average weekly earnings of union members in Illinois were $110 per week, or 14.2 percent higher than non-union members.