Oct. 25--The Pittsburgh region's pool of manufacturing jobs shrunk steadily in the 10 years before the recession began in December 2007, but the area has lost significantly more -- about 11,600 -- of its industrial jobs in less than two years, state figures show.

"This loss is significant for the region," said Sabina Deitrick, co-director of the Urban and Regional Analysis Program at the University of Pittsburgh's Center for Social and Urban Research.

Those manufacturing jobs tend to be linked to high productivity and support advanced technology and positions such as computer programmers and engineers, Deitrick said.

The seven-county region had 88,400 manufacturing jobs in August, down from 100,000 in December 2007, the beginning of the recession. That's a decline of about 12 percent.

Most of the region's major manufacturers have trimmed payrolls to cut costs or bring employment in line with lower production, or both. Alcoa Inc., Allegheny Technologies Inc., AK Steel Corp., ArcelorMittal Holdings, Consol Energy Inc., Kennametal Inc., Nova Chemicals Corp., Sony Corp. and U.S. Steel Corp., are among the manufacturers with slimmer payrolls.

Just a decade ago, 11.4 percent, or 128,600 of the 1.126 million jobs in the region -- Allegheny, Armstrong, Beaver, Butler, Fayette, Washington and Westmoreland counties -- were in manufacturing, according to the state's Center for Workforce Information and Analysis.

Despite the shrinking manufacturing base, the sector remains important to the economy, pumping money and prestige into the region, experts say.

"It is still the biggest contributor of any (occupational ) sector in the region. It's not just the wages, it's the benefit levels," said Harold D. Miller, president of Future Strategies LLC., a Downtown consulting firm. "The higher the wages, the more they support other industries," Miller added.

The average manufacturing worker in the state earned $991 a week last year, according to the state's Center for Workforce Information and Analysis. By comparison, the average worker in the Pittsburgh region earned $735 a week, according to a U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics report in 2008.

"They (manufacturing jobs) have a tremendous spinoff effect ... a tremendous amount of economic benefit. A plant (factory) has a way of supporting a town -- the workers making a product and their money going into the community," said Frank Gamrat, an economist and senior researcher for the Allegheny Institute for Public Policy, a think tank in Castle Shannon.

"There's also a source of pride that goes along with manufacturing.