History of Employment in America

[Ernie]

This is a thread to discuss the history of employment in America and the shifting job market.

Please do not engage in promoting left wing/right wing ideology or critiquing the actions or viewpoints of a particular civil political party or civil political leaning in this thread. Please keep partisan comments/debates out of this thread - avoid comments that reflect negatively on either right-leaning or left leaning political persuasions or persons. Please keep this thread focused on the topic.

[Ernie]

From AI

Here’s a concise historical breakdown of common U.S. jobs by sector (1800–2025).

1800s
Agriculture: 70–80% → ~50% by 1850
Craftsmen/Construction (carpenters, masons, etc.): ~5–8%
Manufacturing (mills, blacksmiths, early factories): ~5–10%
Transport & Trade: ~5–10%
Services (domestic, personal): ~5–10%

1900–1940
Agriculture: 40% → 20%
Manufacturing: 20–25% (textiles, steel, machinery)
Construction: 5–7% (booms in 1920s, post-WWI infrastructure)
Transportation & Utilities: ~10%
Services (total ~15–20%)
-Retail & clerical: ~8%
-Education/health/religious: ~5%
-Domestic/personal: ~4%

1950–1970
Manufacturing: 25–30% (auto, steel, consumer goods)
Construction: 5–8% (suburban housing, highways)
Agriculture: <10%
Service Sector (~40–45%)
-Clerical/administrative: ~15%
-Retail & food: ~10%
-Education, health, gov’t: ~10%
-Professional/business: ~5%

1980–2000
Manufacturing: 15–20% → ~13% by 2000
Construction: ~5%
Agriculture: 2–3%
Service Sector (~60–65%)
-Retail/food/hospitality: ~25%
-Clerical/office/admin: ~15%
-Health/education/social: ~15%
-Finance/professional: ~10%

2010–2025
Manufacturing: ~8%
Construction: ~5%
Agriculture: <2%
Service Sector (~80%)
-Health & personal care: ~20%
-Retail & food: ~20%
-Education, government, nonprofits: ~15%
-Business, tech, finance, management: ~25%

[mike]

Interesting. Points that stood out to me:

Agriculture has dropped from 70-80% in the 1800s to 2% today. That's an incredible decrease due obviously to technology.

Retail wasn't on your list for the 1800s, but a little research shows that this category grew from less than 2% in the early 1800s to 5-6% late century. According to your list, retail is 20% of jobs today.

Interestingly it looks like the 1800s saw the beginning of the transition from people making or trading for everything themselves, to buying products from traders & dealers (i.e. grocery & hardware stores). Also interesting is that hotels boomed late century with the coming of railroads.

Rough percentages by decade

Early 1800s (1800–1840): <2% total. Trade was local; most households bartered or made their own goods. "Merchants & traders" were ~1% of workers; foodservice (taverns) added ~0.2–0.3%.

Mid-century (1850–1870 Census): 3–4% total."Traders & dealers" (grocers, dry-goods merchants, etc.): ~200,000–300,000 people, or 2–2.5% of ~12–15 million workers.
Clerks in stores: ~100,000 (0.7%).
Hotel/innkeepers + boardinghouse keepers: ~50,000 (0.4%).
Waiters, bartenders, restaurant workers: <20,000 (0.1%).

Late century (1880–1890 Census): 5–6% total."Trade & transportation" class: 2 million out of 23 million workers (8.5%), but this bundled rail, teamsters, and wholesalers.
Pure retail (store owners + clerks): ~4%.
Foodservice/hospitality: ~1–1.5% (hotels boomed with railroads; "servants" in private homes are not counted here).

[Praxis+Theodicy]

The shift to a service economy has had huge impacts on American culture and individual wellbeing.

[Ernie]

The shift to a service economy has had huge impacts on American culture and individual wellbeing.

Can you say more about what you observe?

[JohnH]

The shift to a service economy has had huge impacts on American culture and individual wellbeing.

Can you say more about what you observe?

Instead of factory work, a typical occupation people can get now is driving for DoorDash, Uber, etc or filling grocery carts up with InstaCart.

[Ernie]

The shift to a service economy has had huge impacts on American culture and individual wellbeing.

Can you say more about what you observe?

Instead of factory work, a typical occupation people can get now is driving for DoorDash, Uber, etc or filling grocery carts up with InstaCart.

So you are saying that the impact on individual wellbeing is good?

[R7ehr]

No country or person can consume its way into prosperity.

[barnhart]

The shift to a service economy has had huge impacts on American culture and individual wellbeing.

As did the shift from agrarian to industrial...

[Praxis+Theodicy]

Can you say more about what you observe?

Instead of factory work, a typical occupation people can get now is driving for DoorDash, Uber, etc or filling grocery carts up with InstaCart.

So you are saying that the impact on individual wellbeing is good?

I would argue that it was mostly bad. Probably a bit of both. But overall I think it is worse for individual wellbeing, mostly psychologically.

People are generally happy when they make something, and can see and understand and appreciate the value of what they have made. Having control and being involved in as many aspects of the things creation also helps. This gives a sense of accomplishment and purpose. Owning your own business, being self-employed, etc... this might take a LOT of work, and be really risky, but psychologically it can feel much more rewarding, because you feel a greater sense of fulfillment by having full control of what you are making or giving to the world.

Karl Marx talked about the alienation of labor. He was talking about the movement from self-owned agrarian work of peasants to the capitalist-owned factory labor of the new working class. This new form of work produced a much wealthier society and technically even benefitted the working class financially, but the psychological effects don't always match up to one's material reality.

Alienation from the product: Workers do not own or control the products they create. The items become alien objects that do not belong to the worker, even though the worker produced them.
Alienation from the labor process: The worker has little to no control over their work or the conditions under which it is performed. The labor is often repetitive, externally controlled, and a source of unhappiness rather than self-expression.
Alienation from one's species-essence: Marx believed that a core part of being human is creative, free, and conscious labor. Under capitalism, this capacity is suppressed, leading workers to feel a sense of powerlessness and unhappiness, and to feel estranged from their true human nature.
Alienation from other people: Capitalism fosters a competitive and individualistic environment among workers, rather than a communal and cooperative one. Social relations are reduced to the "cash nexus," where individuals see each other as potential competitors or means to an end.

I think the shift from productive economy to a service economy exacerbated these features, because service work does not create a tangible product. Instead, it creates a brief experience for a customer that is instantly consumed and repeated ad infinitum.

In short, the factory worker making bicycles has a better sense of purpose (because he's creating a product) than the ride operator at Six Flags (who is facilitating an experience).