The Toledo, Ohio area lost 22,000 manufacturing jobs between 2001 and 2009.  That according to employment analyst George Zeller, who says the lost jobs were part of an even larger statewide exodus throughout the manufacturing sector.  As a consequence, Zeller notes: “If the national recession is over, it hasn’t shown up in the Ohio labor market yet.”

The largest culprit, unsurprisingly, is the auto industry, which has alternately either moved jobs overseas or been forced to shut down local operations entirely.

The only way to avoid such sharp job declines, said Steve Weathers, president of the Regional Growth Partnership, is to diversify by developing a more broad-based local economy.