With business investment declining in three out of four quarters in 2019 and industrial production down 0.3 percent in January from the prior month, among the jobs that are growing are in warehousing, trucking, and delivery.
Courier and messenger services added 14,300 jobs, expanding for the 11 month in a row. Warehousing and storage added 5,700.
A large number of the new jobs grew out of e-commerce. In the previous 12 months, Amazon has almost tripled the number of contract drivers delivering its products directly from the company’s fulfillment centers. UPS reported a 9 percent hike in deliveries in 2019’s final quarter, largely due to Amazon shipments.
Both UPS and FedEx are also expanding weekend deliveries to keep up with the growing number of people shopping online at home.
Trucking firms brought on 3,200 new workers in January, the strongest gain in a year. Haulage companies, however, are still struggling with weaker demand for transport due to a slowing economy.
PUBLISHER’S NOTE: The huge majority of these jobs carry low pay. Adding more serfs to the manor will give economists and politicians something to boast about, but it will not sustain the American middle class.
And, as we note in the Geopolitical section, the low wage earners will strongly gravitate to the “socialist” side of the political spectrum, thus boosting support for Bernie Sanders in his race to the White House.
