Though our attention has been on the hair-raising problems in the financial sector over the last few weeks, the important (and ultimately deeply related) story about job loss in the American industrial sector needs at least as much attention.

Today, another producer of actual things (rather than just inflationary paper) announced the elimination of thousands of jobs. Daimler AG (NYSE: DAI) said that it will terminate Sterling Trucks, which accounts for 15% of Daimler's truck sales in North America. Daimler is the world's largest producer of heavy vehicles.

Sterling is a subsidiary of Freightliner, the largest heavy truck manufacturer in the U.S., which Daimler has owned since 1981. Originally Ford Motor's (NYSE: F) heavy truck division, Ford/Sterling was bought and re-branded as Sterling in 1997.

Daimler stated that Sterling had never met expectations, and that the ongoing recession made it clear that the division needed to be put out of its misery. Plants in Portland, Oregon and St. Thomas, Ontario will be closed, resulting in the loss of 3,500 manufacturing jobs. Daimler stated that it will proceed with the planned opening of new Freightliner plant in Mexico.

While there's no doubt that there is excess capacity in the truck-making industry and that the elimination of manufacturing plants is economically rational, Daimler's move raises once again the larger question of the health of the manufacturing sector in the U.S. As many critics have argued, the ongoing loss of high-paying manufacturing jobs -- a process that has been going on for years -- will make it that much harder for the American economy to recover.