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North Carolina report finds that manufacturing jobs have declined over the last year

Image shows Howard Miller clock
Courtesy Howard Miller Co.
An accent clock from Howard Miller Co. The company’s closure will affect more than 40 total jobs in Lexington and High Point.

North Carolina continues to shed manufacturing jobs, according to a monthly jobs report from the state’s commerce department.

The overall seasonally adjusted unemployment rate for the state in July was 3.7 percent. That’s the same as it was in June.

Some sectors, such as private education and health services, grew in July by about 2,500.

Manufacturing was among the sectors with a decline, dropping by almost 3,000 workers.

Earlier this year, clock and furniture company Howard Miller announced plans to shut down operations in Lexington and High Point. The move will impact 42 total jobs.

Also, PVH Corp. told state officials in January that it was closing its distribution center in Yadkin County, affecting more than 300 jobs by the end of the year.

Manufacturing was the only major industry with a decrease over the year, with a drop of nearly 9,000 jobs.

Paul Garber is a Winston-Salem native and an award-winning reporter who began his journalism career with an internship at The High Point Enterprise in 1993. He has previously worked at The Augusta (Ga.) Chronicle, The St. Louis Post-Dispatch, The News and Record of Greensboro and the Winston-Salem Journal, where he was the newspaper's first full-time multimedia reporter. He won the statewide Media and the Law award in 2000 and has also been recognized for his business, investigative and multimedia reporting. Paul earned a BA from Wake Forest University and has a Master's of Liberal Arts degree from Johns Hopkins University and a Master's of Journalism and Mass Communication from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He lives in Lewisville.