Regionwide, spending was down 9 percent, to $29.1 billion.
“There’s going to be a continued downward trend across the nation as the efforts in Iraq and Afghanistan wind down,’’ said Christopher Anderson, president of the Massachusetts High Technology Council and the Defense Technology Initiative, a consortium of New England government agencies and defense contractors.
“There are obvious concerns about our regional economy if further cuts are absorbed,’’ he said.
Defense spending accounts for 4 percent of the Massachusetts and New England economies.
A separate study from the Aerospace Industries Association showed that defense budget cuts could lead to sizable job losses in Massachusetts.
That report estimates more than 31,000 Massachusetts workers are directly employed in aerospace- and defense-related industries. A $1 trillion cut in defense spending, for example, would eliminate about 8,200 jobs, with another 17,600 indirect job losses caused by a reduction in economic activity.
Massachusetts is a major producer of high-technology military gear.
Last year’s sales to the Pentagon included $1.3 billion in jet engines and gas turbines; $1.3 billion in guided missiles; and $1.9 billion in defense electronics and communications equipment.
The Defense Technology Initiative commissioned the Donahue Institute study at the request of Senator John F. Kerry, Democrat of Massachusetts, who serves on the 12-member bipartisan congressional supercommittee that is charged with reducing federal expenditures by at least $1.5 trillion over the next decade.
A spokeswoman said the study will help the senator formulate decisions on spending cuts.
“This study from the University of Massachusetts helps equip his team and the New England delegation with new data to consider,’’ said the spokeswoman, Whitney Smith, “and that’s enormously helpful to evaluate as all of Congress faces tough choices ahead.’’
The supercommittee must issue a budget-cutting plan by Nov. 23, and Congress must then pass it within a month. Failure to do so would trigger a series of automatic spending cuts of $1.2 trillion over the next decade, with the reductions to be divided equally between the Defense Department and other agencies.
