Today, the largest share of rural jobs and employment growth comes from the services sector, which employs over half of all rural workers. This dominance of the services sector mirrors the urban employment picture. Rural services related to recreation, retirement, and such natural amenities as mountains, lakes, shorelines, etc., have emerged as important new sources of rural employment and growth. Services and manufacturing together employ more than 2 out of 3 rural workers. Manufacturing also is a major provider of both rural jobs and income, providing jobs for nearly 17 percent of the rural workforce and employing more people than farming, agricultural services, forestry, fishing, and mining combined.
Manufacturing also provides roughly a quarter of all rural earnings.
However, like farming, the share of manufacturing jobs in rural areas has declined. From 1969 to 1992, that share dropped from 20.4 percent to 16.9 percent of rural employment. Given these changes in the rural economy, and its current structure, the economic future and well-being of most rural people now depend on the availability and quality of jobs in the rural services and manufacturing sectors and the entrepreneurial opportunities in those sectors.