Unless you’ve been living under a rock, you know that the American economy is slowly and sluggishly recovering from one of the worst recessions in its history. Many sectors of the economy have been hit very hard by the downturn.Estimates from the Bureau of Labor Statistics suggest that the construction and manufacturing industries have lost more than 2 million jobs each since the recession began in 2007. The financial services industry has lost more than 600,000 jobs in that time.