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ALBANY, GA -- The economic downturn has weathered several industries – some more than others – but a couple industries have fared well, continuing to add jobs despite the recession.

Economists said the weakened economy has caused a shift in the workforce from a manufacturing-based one to a more service-based one.

“Some industries that did a little bit better than others when you think about health care and home health, retail,” said Aaron Johnson, an assistant economics professor at Darton College.

Health care jobs, experts said, also continued to rise because the need for medicine does not fluctuate with the economy.

“We had a really big rise in medical billing and coding,” said Hannah Crain, a staffing specialist at Manpower Group, a staffing firm on Dawson Road. “Anything that has to do with the medical field and anything in the office is what we've been doing a lot with.”

Crain also said the construction industry has been particularly hard hit by the recession since, generally, there is not a lot of construction in stagnate economies.

“You notice a decrease industrial type jobs,” said Crain. “Jobs that deal with manual labor and things like that because we're not doing a lot of building, we're not doing a lot of add ons.”

Jobs requiring math and science skills as well as computer jobs have also remained steady.

“When you think about jobs that are on the increase or in demand, software engineer, computer jobs,” said Johnson. He said having knowledge of math and science is a good way for an employee to market his- or herself in a job-scarce climate.

Albany State University, for example, has experienced an uptick in enrollment in its information technology programs with some of them more than tripling in enrollment.