In 2006, machinists held about 397,000 jobs, 78 percent of which were in manufacturing industries, such as machinery, motor vehicle, aerospace and transportation equipment manufacturing.

Between December 2007 and July 2009, the manufacturing sector lost nearly 2 million jobs, due to downturns in consumer durable goods purchases and housing, according to the National Association of Manufacturers' (NAM) Labor Day 2009: The Manufacturing Report. Over the 19-month period ending in July, NAM's latest annual report says that the industry lost 1.96 million jobs and isn't expected to add employment until 2011.

Because machinery relies to varying degrees on business investment and exports, economic cycles significantly influence machinist employment levels: as the demand for machined goods falls, machinists involved in production may be laid off or forced to work fewer hours.

Machinist employment in plant maintenance, however, is often more stable because proper maintenance and repair of costly equipment remains critical to manufacturing operations, even when production levels fall.

In the long term, according to Van Crotts, president of North Carolina-based machine tool distributor Crotts and Saunders Engineering, Inc., "The reduction in manufacturing in the U.S. has been the most important factor affecting machine tool consumption. In real dollars, fewer machines are consumed each year by a smaller base of manufacturing companies." (See today's Expert's Corner and 2009 Machinery Demand Hinges on Production Growth)

While the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) projects employment of machinists to "decline slowly over the next few years," it also claims that "job opportunities for machinists should continue to be good as employers value the wide-ranging skills of these workers."

Due to modern production techniques, employers still prefer workers such as machinists, who have a wide range of skills and are capable of performing almost any task in a machine shop.

The BLS further explains:

Machinists will become more efficient as a result of the expanded use of, and improvements in, technologies such as CNC machine tools, autoloaders and high-speed machining. This allows fewer machinists to accomplish the same amount of work.

Because machinists monitor and maintain many automated systems, technology is not expected to affect the employment of machinists as significantly as that of some other production workers.

While NAM warns the economy is still fragile, it also confirms signs of improving conditions in the manufacturing sector and forecasts an uptick in employment. "Following a loss of 1.6 million in 2009, manufacturing employment will fall a milder 65,000 next year, before rising 399,000 in 2011, 426,000 in 2012 [and] 89,000 in 2013," the 2009 Labor Day report projects. NAM expects that by 2014, the manufacturing sector will regain more than 40 percent of the jobs lost during the current recession.

Of the 913,000 manufacturing jobs expected to be created in the 2010-2014 period, more than two-thirds (635,000, or 70 percent) will be concentrated in five industries: machinery; fabricated metals; aerospace and other transportation; food and beverage products; and chemicals.

For machinery and fabricated metals, the share of jobs lost in the 2007-2010 period that will be recovered by 2014 is expected to be 76 percent and 51 percent, respectively.

Already, according to American Machinist's 2009 Benchmarks for Machine Shops survey, "many of the top-rated shops in the country have gone to great lengths to instill workforce stability."

The fourth annual benchmarks findings point to a 5 percent median annual labor turnover rate for 2008. The average among all respondents was 10.9 percent, while for "benchmark" shops (those that scored highest in the survey) that number dropped to a 3.7 percent median.

In other words, the report indicates that companies with lower turnover rates are more flexible, thus more successful, in a downturn.

Resources

Machinists: Occupational Outlook Handbook, 2008-09 Edition
Bureau of Labor Statistics

Labor Day 2009: The Manufacturing Report
National Association of Manufacturers, Sept. 3, 2009

Despite Recession, Manufacturers Try to Keep Turnover Down
by editorial staff
American Machinist, July 16, 2009