THE SPATIAL DISTRIBUTION AND BEHAVIOR OF NONPRODUCTION AND PRODUCTION EMPLOYMENT IN U.S. MANUFACTURING PLANTS, 1954-1977 (UNITED STATES)

The primary aim of this thesis was to analyse the spatial dimensions of the relative rise of nonproduction employment within U.S. manufacturing plants from 1954 to 1977. Four diverse industries in particular were studied: textiles, fabricated metals, nonelectrical machinery and electrical equipment. The percentage of total plant employees who were nonproduction workers was found to vary by industry, establishment size, organisation and ownership of the establishment, and overtime. The highest nonproduction worker shares were found in the northeast and the lowest in the southeast for each industry and for all manufacturing.;Within individual states, annual data showed nonproduction employment to be more stable than production, which corresponds with previous evidence that nonproduction jobs have greater protection against short-term fluctuations.;A number of hypotheses seeking to explain the relative rise of nonproduction employment were tested, and the differential effects of capital substitution were found to be paticularly important. In the final chapter, the evidence suggested that the assumption of homogenous labor inputs often invoked (for instance) when the Cobb-Douglas production function is used in regional studies, was not appropriate for these data and so the two employment groups should be disaggregated.;The overall conclusion is that nonproduction and production employment do experience different long-run and short-run behaviour and that these differences portray regional patterns. Much work remains to be carried out in order to more fully understand the reasons for these differences.;When changes in employment were considered, the highest growth rates for all manufacturing were found to be in the southeast during the 1960's and in the west in the 1970's, although each of the four industries exhibited different patterns. In each case nonproduction and production employment growth rates exhibited similar broad regional patterns, but at the level of individual states the growth rates for each type of employment were markedly different.