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Thirty years ago, NH was a job creation machine. Between 1974 and 1984, NH jobs increased 55 percent, double the 25 percent growth rate experienced in New England and nationally in that same decade. In 1984, NH was the fastest growing state east of the Mississippi River, with the exception of Florida. Many in the Granite State wanted that phrase to be the state nickname, (but the acronym FGSEOTMRWTEOF just does not roll off the tongue well).
In 2014, NH's job growth is, by comparison, anemic. Employment in the Granite State increased only 4 percent between 2004 and 2014, only slightly ahead of 3.5 percent experienced by New England as a whole and behind the national growth of 5.2 percent. As a nation, region and state, we are taking a long time to recover all of the jobs lost in the Great Recession.
Manufacturing's Decline
Go back 30 years and 445,000 people worked in nonagricultural jobs in NH, with 123,000 of those jobs in the manufacturing sector. Today about 650,000 hold jobs in NH's private and government sectors, with only 66,000 working in manufacturing, accounting for 12 percent of the state's jobs today versus 28 percent in 1984. New Hampshire continues its transition from jobs dominated by blue collar professions to a knowledge and service based economy.
The evolution in technology during the past 30 years has dramatically reshaped NH's economy. While there were computers in 1984, the Internet was barely in its infancy. The era of the personal computer was just starting. Instead of the Internet communications there were Bulletin Board Systems (BBS) that you could link to over phone lines, and 2400 baud modem was a tech leap at the time. America Online (AOL) would not start offering services until 1985.
Digital Equipment, NH's second largest manufacturing employer in 1984 at 6,800 NH employees, was the leading manufacturer of mini-computers used by most medium-sized businesses that could not afford IBM's bigger systems. But IBM, and then a small startup called Apple, was developing desktop computers that were destined to finally drive Digital Equipment out of business.
Of the largest manufacturing employers in NH in 1984, many no longer exist. Even those that do exist have half the number of employees compared to...