Morgan Stanley, Goldman Sachs and a Japanese bank are moving some of their high-paying Manhattan jobs into the suburbs, continuing a hemorrhaging trend that’s escalated greatly since Sept. 11.

As of yesterday, there have been at least 22 companies from the World Trade Center area saying they’ll move all or some staffers – half to New Jersey and the other half to areas including Long Island and Westchester.

The majority of the 215 companies that had more than 10,000 square feet in the area on Sept. 11 have already relocated to Midtown. Only 10 tenants have relocated downtown.

Only 80 companies with offices in damaged buildings are expected to stay in lower Manhattan.

The firms say the redeployment is a way to spread resources – and make themselves less vulnerable to disasters.

Morgan Stanley – which lost six employees and its offices in the trade center – yesterday said it’s in talks to buy Texaco’s former four-story, 725,000 square-foot headquarters in Harrison, N.Y. No price has been announced, but it is expected to be less than $50 million.

The complex is nestled on 107 acres off the Hutchinson River Parkway, where Texaco once housed up to 1,500 people. Atlas Air, a cargo transport company, currently leases 120,000 square feet of the property.

Morgan sold its nearly completed Midtown building at 745 Seventh Ave. to Lehman Bros., and made a policy decision not to concentrate all its employees in one area. Morgan will keep corporate headquarters at 1585 Broadway.

Goldman Sachs already had a 1.2 million-square-foot project at 30 Hudson, in Jersey City, under construction and to be ready by 2004. But employees hadn’t known which divisions would move until a memo written last week.

The memo – obtained by Bloomberg News – explained that the move to Jersey would affect the trading and research arm of its equities area, and make it easier to integrate the newly acquired Spear Leeds Kellogg division.

The newly combined Mizuho Corporate Bank – the successor to Industrial Bank of Japan, Dai-ichi Kanygo and Fuji Bank – is expected to sign a sublease for 110,000 square feet from Charles Schwab at Plaza 10 in Harborside, Jersey City. The bank is keeping other space in Midtown.

Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle (D-S.D.) said the decision by some big firms to move only highlights the need to jump-start lower Manhattan’s economy.

“I think it’s unfortunate but hopefully – if we can pass this legislation soon – we will see the end of reports such as these,” said Daschle, who was joined by Sens. Charles Schumer and Hillary Rodham Clinton at the Regent hotel on Wall Street.

While some big companies were known to be window-shopping for possible sites in Westchester, Royal Bank of Canada has been the only big company to ink a deal for 40,000 square feet in Purchase.

American Express is leasing space in both New Jersey and Connecticut, but a spokesman told The Post it would start to return to Manhattan in April.

“There may have been smaller deals that we are not aware of, but they are not large organizations like Morgan Stanley,” said Sal Carrera, Westchester’s director of economic development and real estate.

OUTTA TOWN

Jersey City will be home to, among others, Goldman Sachs.

Companies with branches that have left downtown since the Sept. 11 attacks on the World Trade Center:

American Express

Citigroup

Empire Blue Cross Blue Shield

Frenkel & Company

Garban Securities

Goldman Sachs

KBW Asset Management

Lehman Brothers

Mizuho Corporate Bank

Nomura Securities

Port Authority of NY/NJ

Royal Bank of Canada

287 Bowman Avenue

Purchase, N.Y.

source: Cityfeet.com; CoStar Group; Colliers/ABR and Tenantwise.com