According to the New England Economic Forecast, job growth in Maine is expected to be much slower than economists had forecast previously. Employment levels the state had previously been forecast to reach this year will not come about until 2009. In recent years, job gains in sectors other than manufacturing had offset manufacturing job losses, but that trend has ended. And revisions to employment data now show that job growth that had been expected last year in Maine did not occur, and figures for 2004 have also been revised downward.