AUTOMOTIVE: America's Largest Manufacturing Industry.

The automobile industry is America's largest manufacturing industry, accounting for 6.6 million jobs nationwide, or about 5% of private-sector jobs. That's a key finding of a study prepared by the University of Michigan and the Center for Automotive Research (CAR) and released in March.

According to "Contribution of the Automotive Industry to the U.S. Economy," the automobile industry directly employs 1.4 million Americans in all 50 states. Another 2.1 million U.S. workers are employed indirectly by auto industry suppliers and other industry-related companies. Expendit