Aaahh, yes. The first Monday of September. One last victory lap to close out summer. Soak it in, folks.

Congress unanimously voted to make Labor Day a national holiday in 1894 after several workers were killed by members of the military and the U.S. marshals during a railroad strike. President Grover Cleveland signed the bill into law and we’ve been celebrating the U.S. workforce the first Monday of September ever since.

For those of you spending your Labor Day in front of a computer, let’s take a quick look at how the U.S. labor force has changed over the last half century.

The U.S. economy leaned heavily on agriculture and manufacturing for generations, but in 1971 the invention of the microprocessor sped up the transition to the service-driven economy we know today.

In 2010, Graphic designer Francesco Franchi created the below infographic to illustrate the changes the labor forces of the U.S., Japan, France and Germany have experienced since Intel introduced the first commercial microprocessor 42 years ago.

Are you surprised by what he found?

[Click to enlarge]

Follow Cliff on Twitter @Cliff_Sims