Friday, December 28, 2018

Abq Leads Job Production

Albuquerque continues to lead the job production parade among New Mexico’s metro areas. Wage jobs in the Duke City increased by 10,000 between November 2017 and November 2018.
The numbers, which are preliminary, are in the Labor Market Review newsletter, released late today by the Department of Workforce Solutions.
Albuquerque grabbed 55% of the 18,100 new wage jobs reported statewide (a 2.1% increase) for the November to November year. These preliminary numbers will take a big in early March when a cleaner set of statistics are plugged in. For now, though, the good cheer of 2%+ job growth will carry into the new year.
The other three metro areas did grow, just a lot less than Albuquerque. In alphabetical order, it was Farmington, +400 jobs, 0.8%; Las Cruces, +500 jobs, 0.7%; Santa Fe, +500 job, 0.8%.
The big growth for Albuquerque came in professional and business services, up 3,500, and leisure and hospitality, up 2,000.
Government added 2,200 jobs with 1,400, or 64%, in state government as Gov. Susana Martinez prepared to end her eight years in office.

Friday, December 21, 2018

Employment Supposedly Grows 2.1%. Downward Adjustment Expected

For November, New Mexico joined 40 other states with a stable unemployment rate. We held at 4.6%. We had the nation’s largest unemployment rate decline over the past year (-1.4 percentage points).
Alaska kept the nation’s highest unemployment rate with 6.3%. We are tied with Ohio for seventh place. The five states between us and Alaska include those perennial favorites, Mississippi and West Virginia.
Our 2.1% increase in employment (17,700 jobs), year over year, is considered statistically significant by the Bureau of Labor Statistics which prepares the numbers and sends them to the states to massage. The Department of Workforce Solutions released the November employment numbers about 3:30 this afternoon.
The guess from state economists is that these pretty 2%+ job increase numbers will be statistically adjusted down about a percentage point early next year. Fake news?The change will come as part of an annual rebasing of job reports.
Leisure and hospitality (tourism) continues to lead sector job production on a not seasonally adjusted basis with employment growing 7,000 jobs, an astonishing 7.3%, between Novembers. Construction followed with 3,000 jobs for a 4.3% increase statewide.
Professional and business services grew by 2,500, followed by transportation, up 1,700, and health care and social assistance, up 1,400.