Its four departments (Meurthe-et-Moselle, Moselle, Meuse and the Vosges) and two cities, Nancy (with 330,000 inhabitants) and Metz (with 195,000), have not saved Lorraine from becoming one of the regions hardest-hit by the recession and unemployment (with 10,000 annual job losses from 1980 to 1990). The sectors worst affected were the iron and steel, textiles and coal industries.

Fine Arts Museum in Nancy, place Stanislas (Meurthe-et-Moselle, Lorraine)

This remains essentially an industrial region, except in the Vosges mountains in the south, where the mountain scenery and pine forests have generated thriving tourist and winter sports industries, as well as many thermal spas.