SECTION 2. ECONOxMIC IMPORTANCE OF THE FOREST 

 INDUSTRIES OF THE PACIFIC NORTHWEST 



By Blair Stewart ' 



There can be no question as to the iniportance of tlic 

 forest industries in the economy of the Pacific North- 

 west. It is not easy, liowever, to indicate with any 

 precision the degree of that importance. A (juantitative 

 I expression of the significance of the forest industries can 

 be secured only if some measurable characteristic is 

 accepted as a proper test. No completely satisfactory 

 single measure has been found, and it has thus been 

 necessary to consider a number of diflerent tests, and to 

 present a picture which is a mosaic, the pieces of which 

 are drawn from different sources. 



It is none the less a realistic picture, and from it 

 certain significant, if broad, conclusions can be drawn. 

 Forest industries provide the Region's pay rolls as does 

 no other single line of endeavor. One out of every ten 

 persons gainfully emplo^yed is engaged duecth' in a 

 forest industry. The proportion is larger when males 

 only are considered, and this gives added significance to 

 forest industries, because men on the average have more 

 dependents than women. 



Among manufacturing industries in the Region, the 

 production of forest products is of overwhelmuig im- 

 portance. They employ half of the workers engaged in 

 manufacturing,and the pi'oportion wovdd be still higher if 

 those industries which are directly dependent upon forest 

 industries were included in the forest industries group. 



In a complex industrial civilization, it is essential that 

 every region have products to send to other areas to 

 l)ay for the wide variety of products which make pos- 

 sible tlie complex consumption patterns characteristic 

 of the American standaril of living. For the Pacific 

 Northwest, the forest industries perform tliis function 

 in an outstanding manner. Forest jiroducts provide 

 more than 40 percent of the balance secured by the 

 shipment of goods from the Pacific Northwest. 



The activities dependent upon the forest resource of 

 the Pacific Northwest provide employment for mam- 

 service industries. Transportation may be taken as 

 an example: 03 percent of the freight tonnage origmat- 

 ing on railroads in the Pacific Northwest consists of 

 forest products. Inland navigation is even more com- 

 pletely dependent on movement of forest ])roducts, 

 ahnost 87 percent of the tonnage of inland water car- 



I The statistical wr)rk for this section was supervised by Franlc J. Hone, and many 

 fstions were made by him and other memtwrscif the stall of the Pacific Northwest 

 I'inal Planning Comnii.ssion. The .'ftate planning boards of Maho, Montana, 



*-'on, and Washington a:f:sisted in the a.sseintily of data. Acknowledgment is made. 



I', of the a.ssistance of various governmental agencies, including the utilities com- 



issions of the four I'aciftc Northwest States. 



riers of the Pacific Northwest being nuide up of such 

 commodities. Forest products' manufacturing plants 

 are also very important customers of electric power in- 

 dustry — consuming over 40 percent of the power pur- 

 chased by manufacturing plants in the Region. 



The rise ami fall of communities in the Pacific North- 

 west is to be explained in almost eveiy case in terms of 

 the exploitation and tlejjletion of the forest resource. 



The basis on which the above statements regarding 

 the economic importance of the forest mdustries of the 

 Pacific Northwest is set forth in more detail in what 

 follows. An attempt is made also to indicate some of 

 the implications of these broad statements. 



Employment in the Forest Industries 

 of the Pacific Northwest 



At first glance the number of persons engaged in an 

 industry seems a valid measure of its economic im- 

 portance, and certainlj' no discussion of the problem 

 would be complete if this infomiation were not included. 

 One person out of every ten gainfully employed in the 

 Pacific Northwest is directly engaged in some forest 

 industry.^ In Oregon and Washington the proportion 

 is approximately 1 in 8, in Idaho about 1 in 14 or 

 15, and in Montana only about 1 in 42 or 43. Employ- 

 ment figures by industries are shown in table A, which 

 may be found in the Appendix to this section. Suice 

 many of the manufacturing and mechanical industries 

 are in reality service activities, agricultin-e and forest 

 ])roducts stand out as the overwhelmuigly important 

 basic activities. 



If men only are considered, the relative unporttince 

 of the forest industries is still gretiter. The proportions 

 of all gainfully emplo\-ed males working in forest 

 products' industries were as follows in 1930: Idaho, 

 1 in 12.0; Montana, 1 in 37. (i; Ort'gon, 1 in G.7; 

 Washington, I in 0.7; Pacific Nortiiwest, 1 in 8.2. 

 More detailed information on employment of males by 

 industry is given in table B (in Apj^endix to Section 2). 



The dependence of population of the Pacific North- 

 west on forest industries for employment varies greatly 

 witliin the Region, and witliin tiie States. Tiiis is 

 strikingly shown in Figure 1, which shows tlie per- 

 centivge of all gainfully employed males who were 

 ('m[)lnyed ill the forest |)roducts' industries in li130. 

 It mav be seen that the entire area west of tlie Cascaile 



■ Baseii on 19.10 Censu.'! subtracting classes A and B linemployed from total "gain- 

 fill workers." 



59 



