Emma Sidoriak

Chapter 6: THE FALL OF THE GARMENT INDUSTRY

Decline in the Late 20th Century

In 1969, the number of apparel and textile workers in Pennsylvania peaked at 200,000 and has been declining ever since. In 1984, there were 102,000 workers, and in 1998, there were 25,000 workers. Concurrently, in the early 1960s, 5 out of every 100 garments sold in the United States were foreign-made. By the 1990s, this number of foreign-made goods rose to 60 (Wolensky, 2003). By the last decade of the 20th century, it was clear that the garment industry was leaving the anthracite region and other regions of the United States and moving to foreign countries.

Jobs in the textile and apparel factories of Schuylkill County were unsteady in the 1990s; layoffs and factory closings were all too common. From 1990 to 1997, garment industry jobs in Schuylkill County dropped by 60%. While jobs in the garment industry were disappearing, citizens of Schuylkill County naturally turned to other jobs to support themselves and their families. During the 1990s, service jobs, such as cashier and restaurant waiter, increased by 18.3% (Parker, 1999).

Another sign of the declining garment industry in the United States and especially in the anthracite coal region was the collapse of labor unions. Backed by several bills and government assistance to uphold workers’ rights, labor unions were still fairly powerful until the 1980s and 1990s. From 1966 to 1986, American women and children working in the garment industry who were ILGWU members dropped by 60%. In 1995, because of decreasing membership, the ILGWU merged with another large union, Amalgamated Clothing and Textile Workers’ Union to form Union of Needletrades, Industrial, and Textile Employees (UNITE!).     Despite the establishment of UNITE!, union membership continued to dissipate (Wolensky, 2003). A correlation exists between the decline of the labor unions and the decline of the garment industry in the region. It is important to note that since textile and apparel production have moved elsewhere, unionization is not common in international garment factories.

The 21st Century: What is Left

Tables 6.1 and 6.2 show the number of establishments and the number of employees in the textile and garment industry in the years of 1999, 2005 and 2011. Based upon the North American Industry Classification System, the textile and garment industry are a conglomerate of textile mills, textile product mills and apparel manufacturers. The tables compare Schuylkill County to Pennsylvania and the United States to show that the decline of the textile and garment industry in Schuylkill County was more dramatic than the rest of the state and country; this is especially obvious in the Table 6.2, which shows that Schuylkill County’s decrease in textile and apparel establishments range from 15.8 to 25.9 percentage points more than the broader populations’ (U.S. Census Bureau, 2011).

The Effects on Schuylkill County’s Current Economy

The demise of the garment industry proved costly to Schuylkill County as the economy of the region heavily relied on textile and apparel production. As mentioned in the previous chapter, a main consequence was a major displacement of garment factory workers. Like other manufacturing industries and regions of the United States, workers in Schuylkill County still incur transition costs from the decline of the garment industry; however, Schuylkill County differs from some other areas because rather than participating in a different industry, many citizens have chosen to leave. In relation to Chapter 1, the fall of the garment industry has been a factor in the county’s declining economy, directly contributing to the decreasing and aging population and to the low employment status relative to the rest of the state and country. Without industry or a substantial labor pool, Schuylkill County’s economy lacks potential for growth.