The line graph illustrates how many jobs, measured in millions, were there in four secors of the US economy – manufacturing, retail, agriculture and healthcare – from 1960 to 2020.
Overall, manufacturing was the largest employer for most of the period, despite experiencing a considerable decline after 1980. Both retail and healthcare saw upward trends, while employment in agriculture decreased gradually throughout the whole period.
In details, manufacturing employed 15 million people in 1960 before reaching a peak at 20 million two decades later. Thereafter, the figure fell steadily to roughly 16 million in 2000 and declined further to approximately 13 million by the end of the period. Agriculture followed a similar pattern, with employment dropping from just over 5 million to 3 million in 1980. Having remained unchanged until 2000, the figure then fell slightly to around 2 million at the end of the period.
By contrast, retail and healthcare experieced continuous growth and ended up at around 16 million jobs in 2020. Employment in retail started its path at around 6 million in 1960 and grew regularly, while healthcare began at its lowest, at just 2 million, and increased eightfold by the end of the period.
