The topic contraction is discussed in the following articles:

income theory

  • TITLE: economic stabilizer
    SECTION: Effects of business contraction
    When business begins to contract, the first manifestation is a decrease in investment that causes unemployment in the capital goods industries; the unemployed are deprived of the cash wage receipts required to make their consumption demands effective. Unemployment then spreads to consumer goods industries. In expansion, the opposite occurs: an increase in investment (or in government spending)...

labour force

  • TITLE: labour economics (social science)
    SECTION: Deployment of the labour force
    ...of administrative, clerical, and technical workers relative to manual workers. A second course of change has affected occupations linked with particular industries, when those industries have contracted or expanded as compared with others. Coal mining and cotton textiles are examples of contraction. The service industries, on the other hand, have expanded: a greater proportion of...