1 Recent Economic Developments Strong growth in exports so far in Little change in standards for C&I loans to small firms over the past three months. Poor sales remain the single most important problem for small businesses.

2 Exports of goods and services rose 16.9 percent in January- April 2010 from their year-ago level, a significant rebound from the 2009 decline.

3 The standards on C&I loans to small firms were roughly unchanged in April from their January level (solid blue line in the chart above). In addition, a small net percentage of banks reported that demand for C&I loans from small firms weakened further over the past three months.

4 Only four percent of owners report that finance and interest rates were their big problem at the start of the second quarter, according to the NFIB. Poor sales remained their single most important problem.

5 Exports Support American Jobs John Tschetter Office of the Chief Economist Economics and Statistics Administration U.S. Department of Commerce

6 Exports supported a record 10.3 million jobs in 2008, accounting for 6.9 percent of total employment.

7 More than half of the 10.3 million jobs supported by exports occurred in two industries: manufacturing and professional and business services

8 Manufacturing’s share of export-supported jobs has gone down modestly over time, while the professional and business services’ share has gone up.

9 About 27% of the jobs in the manufacturing sector were supported by exports in Exports also accounted for a significant share of jobs in transportation and warehousing, agriculture, and wholesale trade.

10 Export-supported share of total manufacturing jobs rose to a record level in 2008 from the average of 20%.

11 Two-thirds of the export-supported mfg. jobs in 2008 occurred directly in the final assembly of the exported good. The remaining one-third occurred indirectly in the production of material inputs. These percentages were reversed for the export-supported jobs in the professional and business services industry.

12 Researchers have used widely different forms of economic analyses to demonstrate the relationship between exports and jobs. This study uses input–output (IO) analysis to measure the links for 1993–2008. These snapshots reflect average (sometimes labeled accounting) relationships. In IO analyses, if 10 percent of an industry output is exported, then 10 percent of the industry’s employment is attributed to exports. The averages tell us nothing about employment requirements for the first or last dollar of output. Averages derived from IO analysis should not be used as proxies for change. They should not be used to estimate the net change in employment that might be supported by increases or decreases in total exports, in the exports of selected products, or in the exports to selected countries or regions. The report is available at: