Even before the Great Recession, U.S. employment growth was unimpressive. Between 2000 and 2007, the economy gave back … the considerable gains in employment rates it had achieved during the 1990s, with major contractions in manufacturing … employment being a prime contributor to the slump. The U.S. employment "sag" of the 2000s is widely recognized but poorly …

from 1977 to 1997. Both employment and output growth are slower for plants that face higher levels of low wage import …