So who's hiring these days? Manufacturers, apparently, in need of new skilled workers to replace an aging work force that's retiring after decades of service to Connecticut's factories and machine shops.

Considering the median age of today's manufacturing worker is 40, there should be plenty of opportunities - but these employers want workers who have math, writing and likely computer skills to compete in a global economy.

Upbeat hiring news in this sagging economic recovery is surely good news, and most of the findings from the 2011 CBIA Connecticut Manufacturing Workforce Survey show a positive trend in manufacturing, aside from a continuing worry that workers sometimes lack basic skills needed in today's more high-tech manufacturing settings.

The survey, commissioned by the Connecticut Community Colleges' Regional Center for Next Generation Manufacturing, says that manufacturers are expecting their work forces to grow by 3 percent to 6 percent over the next five years. The survey also details the top most-difficult positions to fill: computer numerical control (CNC) programmers and machinists, tool-and-die makers, computer-aided design and computer-aided manufacturing technicians, and engineers.

Karen Wosczyna-Birch, who is the executive director of the community colleges' next-generation manufacturing program, said higher education is vitally important to prepare students for the 21st century needs of manufacturing. "Our goal," she said in the CBIA manufacturing-survey report, "remains to continue engaging and motivating the next generation of workers to pursue careers in manufacturing while ensuring they have the skill sets needed to be successful."

That's important, since the Connecticut Business & Industry Association survey showed more than a third of the respondents said entry-level employees lack "employability" skills - including punctuality and an overall work ethic, along with math and reading issues.

James F. Kash, a certified public accountant and partner at J.H. Cohn LLP, which also sponsored the annual survey, said payroll costs are the largest cost that manufacturers face, so it's important that our work forces have the commensurate skills and capabilities to compete in a global economy.

"As global labor costs rise, it only underscores the need to reinforce the talent and benefit companies will realize from working with American companies, instead of going overseas," he said in the survey report.

Manufacturing, which has seen a long erosion of both workers and manufacturers across Connecticut, makes up about 10 percent of this state's overall employment of about 1.6 million. Locally, manufacturing in the New London and Norwich labor market makes up more than 11 percent of the overall work force of some 128,000. Historically, manufacturing-related wages have been higher than those in the service sectors, although the overwhelming number of jobs across Connecticut, and locally, as well, are in the services arena, rather than goods-producing jobs.

Judith Resnick, who is the executive director of CBIA's Education Foundation, said the survey also points out that Connecticut manufacturers are at a "critical juncture."

"They face an exodus of mid- and senior-level employees who will take with them longstanding institutional knowledge and experience." In the interim, manufacturers are seeing some workers who don't have the requisite skills needed for today's computer-driven manufacturing shops. Resnick, along with others, calls for business as well as education to work together so that manufacturing recruits have the right skills for a strong future with a manufacturer right here in Connecticut.

Anthony Cronin is The Day's business editor.