When it comes to middle-wage job losses, much of the focus is on the blue collar occupations that are generally held by men without college degrees — construction, installation/maintenance/repair, production, and transportation. The story of how globalization, technological change, and other factors have hollowed out these jobs is well known. Not only are their fewer such job opportunities, but their relative wages have eroded to the point where, say, the remaining manufacturing jobs no longer pay much of a premium compared to the economy overall. This is one reason nonparticipation rates are rising among prime working age men without college degrees.
However, there is an important aspect to the decline of middle-wage jobs that is generally not discussed as much: their impact on women. Whenever I give a presentation on our office’s state level job polarization work, I always talk about Mad Men. In the office scenes of the show, there is always one administrative assistant outside of each office. No modern workplace looks like that. Today, one office support specialist serves multiple managers instead with relative ease. Increased productivity can be seen due to computers, software, travel websites and the like. This speaks nothing about other office support occupations like switchboard operators, file clerks and typists which have effectively been eliminated entirely. My back of the envelope calculations show the decline of office support jobs in the Oregon economy overall from 2000 to 2015 has resulted in nearly 50,000 fewer such jobs — for both sexes and all ages — due to this increased productivity and changing workplace practices. That’s equal to one full year of good job growth in the entire state, so a huge number.
While all of the above is true and I regularly discuss these trends on both blue and white collar jobs, I still was not fully prepared for these results. The decline of office and administrative support jobs for women with a high school diploma or less rivals the decline of production jobs for men with the same educational attainment here in Oregon.
In the 1970s, about 1 in 5 prime working age Oregon men with a high school diploma or less worked in a production job, essentially the manufacturing jobs that actually do the manufacturing. In the 1980s, about 1 in 5 prime working age Oregon women with a high school diploma or less worked in an office and administrative support job. Today, employment rates in these occupations is roughly half of what it was a generation ago for these demographic groups. The production declines for men are more severe, however the decline of office support jobs for women is certainly of a similar scale.
Middle-wage job losses are not just a blue collar male issue; women have seen large erosion in employment opportunities as well. Where the gender trends differ somewhat, at least in Oregon, is that low-wage work among women without college degrees has increased in recent decades, whereas for men the increases in this type of work are pretty minimal.
Additional Notes:
As a check on the data used here, which has a relatively small sample size, I also looked at Census data from 1980 to 2014. It shows an EPOP decline for males in production jobs of 9.4 percentage points and for women in office support jobs of 7.1 percentage points. So roughly similar to the graph above. What does differ in the Census/ACS data is that the decline for women in office support occupations has all been since 2000. This decline has been particularly large from 2007 to 2014.
One thing that is clear in the ASEC data is that in the past 5-10 years, the share of office support jobs going to women with a college degree has risen considerably. From the late 1980s through 2010, the share of female office support workers with a college degree was 15-20% of all such jobs, among prime working age Oregon women. The 2013-15 average is 34%. This is a massive change. It is also confirmed by anecdotal reports from our friends at Employment, like Christian Kaylor, who talks about how businesses today use a college degree requirement for office support jobs as a mechanism to screen the applicant pool, even though the jobs generally do not require a degree. The data confirm this is having an impact on who gets the jobs.
Finally, in the Census data I also looked at the U.S. overall. Here the decline of men in production jobs with a high school diploma or less declined by a similar margin as in Oregon (9.1 percentage points nationally). However women in office support jobs only fell 4.6 percentage points over this time, considerably smaller than in Oregon. I do not have a good reason for why this differs as the historical figures for 1980, 1990 and 2000 are very similar for Oregon and the U.S. One hypothesis could be the increased number of women with college degrees in office support jobs in Oregon has been larger than national trends. Thus the shift of educational attainment within these jobs is driving the larger Oregon decline. However, that is just a hypothesis at this point.
Oregon Office of Economic Analysis 
MadMen references are always appreciated. We’ve come a long way . . . maybe?
By: Amy on July 7, 2016
at 10:04 AM
Thanks, certainly a great show.
We’ve certainly come a long way in terms of the types of jobs women have in the economy today compared to the 1960s and 1970s. Although many issues still remain of course from the gender wage gap, lack of representation among top managerial positions and the like. Further progress is required there. But the fact that job polarization impacts both sexes is an interesting fact that I haven’t seen explored as much…
By: Josh Lehner on July 7, 2016
at 10:09 AM
What too many people miss is the fact that the trends you have noted did not start with the previous election cycle and, more importantly, will not end with the next. Due to a myriad of factors, including globalization, technological advances, women entering the workforce, more college graduates, etc., have eliminated many jobs and driven down wages in others. Beginning in the mid-80’s, we began to see a decoupling of wage growth from productivity and a stagnation of middle class wages that continues to this day.
Numerous voices have correctly noted that raising GDP would help as ” …a rising tide floats all boats.” However, achieving and sustaining a given GDP level has proven difficult in the past and, given current global financial weakness, a sudden surge in GDP seems unlikely. Likewise, we’re about out of arrows in the monetary quiver and proposals for a change in fiscal policy – mostly tax reductions – seem to be based more on hope than reality. In any event, even assuming we can somehow grow GDP, will the downward slope for lower wage/educated employees likely be reversed? I suspect not as it seems more likely that 30+ year trend favoring capital over labor will continue.
What could make a difference is a significant increase in the investment in our most precious resource – our people. Increased support for early childhood education, child care, job retraining, more affordable secondary education and an effective public/private partnership – ala Germany – that would train and bring people into the workforce would all help. However, given the current disdain for anything that smacks of Big Government or socialism, it seems unlikely that Congress would seriously entertain any of these suggestions. In the end, things may need to get a lot worse before any real change may be possible.
By: Scott Boone on July 7, 2016
at 3:42 PM
[…] Those without a college degree find themselves without leverage, and out of options. More than 1 in 5 Oregon men of prime working age – but without a college degree – worked in manufacturing as recently as the 1990s. Now it’s fewer than 1 in 10, according to work published by Lehner earlier this summer. […]
By: Falling behind by staying in place: Portland's prosperity bypasses many | Tera News on September 2, 2016
at 7:16 AM
[…] relate to blue-collar, male-dominated occupations and industries, they apply to women as well. The decline in office and administrative support occupations does rival the decline of production (manufacturing) jobs here in Oregon. Women without college […]
By: Economic Anxiety in Oregon, A Summary | Oregon Office of Economic Analysis on November 9, 2016
at 1:14 PM
[…] Automation impacts middle-wage jobs considerably. See here for our historical look at the wood products industry in Oregon. Also here to see how automation and technological change impacts women in middle-wage jobs just as much as it does men. […]
By: City Club of Portland (Video and Research Links) | Oregon Office of Economic Analysis on January 10, 2017
at 1:40 PM
[…] When it comes to middle-wage jobs there are a few important things to keep in mind. First, they impact both men and women, particularly those without college degrees. While many of us know the story of the manufacturing decline hurting men without college degrees, the same thing is true for women and administrative and office support occupations. In fact, here in Oregon the relative decline of office support jobs for women and production jobs for men have been equal in rec…. […]
By: Job Polarization, 2016 Update | Oregon Office of Economic Analysis on March 31, 2017
at 8:32 AM
[…] Since our original report, there have been a few slight tweaks to the methodology we use. We are always looking to improve. It does not change the fundamental trends or outcomes, however we are working to refine our analysis. Below you can see each individual occupational group, how we classify it into the wage categories and its growth in recent years. You will notice that the occupational groups seeing the largest employment declines, and slower recoveries, are dominated by the various middle-wage jobs. You can also see why we talk about how polarization impacts both men and women here in Oregon. […]
By: Job Polarization in Oregon, 2016 Update | Oregon Office of Economic Analysis on April 6, 2017
at 9:35 AM
[…] like production — the manufacturing jobs that actually do the manufacturing. However it impacts women to the same degree due to the loss of office support jobs. These shifts can largely be traced to automation and […]
By: Urban Wage Premium, Pacific Northwest Edition | Oregon Office of Economic Analysis on March 20, 2019
at 10:00 AM