The South Dakota Department of Labor reports that unemployment in Lake County rose in January to 5.8%, up from 5.4% in December.
But pick up Friday's Madison Daily Leader, and you'll see this headline: "County Unemployment Falls Slightly in 2010." What's the story here?
The Leader is correct in stating that Lake County's unemployment rate dropped. In January 2010, the local jobless rate was 6.0%. But look at the numbers underlying those percentages:
| Date | Workforce | Jobs | Unemployed | Unemp. Rate |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Jan 2010 | 6445 | 6055 | 390 | 6.0% |
| Dec 2010 | 6505 | 6155 | 350 | 5.4% |
| Jan 2011 | 6375 | 6005 | 370 | 5.8% |
We flushed 150 jobs in one month. Lake County now has 6005 jobs. That's the lowest number of jobs we've had in Lake County since December 1999.
And in the statistic never, ever reported in the local paper, we now have 660 fewer jobs than we did in October 2006, when the Lake Area Improvement Corporation announced its "Forward Madison" plan to create 400 new jobs by the end of 2011. Do put those numbers together: to meet the Forward Madison jobs goal, Madison needs to create 1060 new jobs by year end.
Around the neighborhood, January was tough on most everybody:
- Brookings County unemployment rate: 4.2% (up 0.2 from Dec. 2010)
- Kingsbury: 5.6% (+0.7)
- McCook: 6.3% (+0.3)
- Minnehaha: 5.4% (+0.5)
- Moody: 7.4% (+1.1)
The closest county to a bright spot is Miner: The county added 15 jobs in January, but it also added 15 people to its total labor force, keeping the number of unemployed folks the same.
The tough job outlook around the state suggests that it may be unfair to criticize Lake County leaders for underperforming on job creation and economic development in a period when everybody has taken hits. But let's compare Lake County's decade-plus lack of job growth with our neighbors in Brookings County and the state as a whole:
This chart shows the 12-month average labor force and jobs as percentages of 2001 averages. The blue line shows the 12-month jobs average for Brookings. Yellow is jobs in South Dakota as a whole. Red is Lake County jobs. Where those lines are higher than the 100 line, that means the jobs averages in those places were higher than they were in 2001.
National recession notwithstanding (and remember, it wasn't really a recession in South Dakota, as our GDP has yet to shrink!), Brookings County averaged about 10% more jobs last year than it had in 2001. South Dakota as a whole maintained just about 6% more jobs in 2010 than its 2001 level. Lake County's 2010 jobs average was 4% points below its 2001 average.
In simplest terms, Lake County is worse off jobwise than it was ten years ago. Brookings County and the state are better off. Until Madison learns what Brookings and South Dakota are doing right, the LAIC's Web address will remain a misnomer.
I wish our town took jobs as seriously as they do sidewalks and we'd have something.
John, imagine if we had taken the $2.3-million Forward Madison fund and spent it all on installing sidewalks. We'd at least have something to show for our money that folks in town could use.
Our economic development corporation serves the interests of its members. Its director serves the board. We come in last. Big surprise.
And that, my friend, needs to change. Too bad there's not some electoral accountability for the LAIC. Time to prep some questions for our city commission candidates! Anyone know where challenger Roger Husman stands on city involvement in economi development?
When a coach has three or four sub-500 seasons, the team owners usually cut 'em loose because there are other coaches who can produce wins. At some point, hope and promise become reality and reality becomes fantasy. When do we recognize the stage we're in today?
Let's throw in a little good news. Gehl had a career fair this weekend, and I've heard as many as 40 jobs could be added there. So maybe only 1020 to go!
I want to believe, Matt... but on top of those 40 jobs, we'd have to bring four more Gehls to town to meet the Forward Madison goal.
You liberal pessimist, would you just let the invisible hand do it's job. It's invisible because we don't need to see what it's doing!
Matt, when it uses my tax dollars to do its job, then I want the hand to be visible.
Hee hee -- I thought the invisible hand was part of the official City of Madison Seal... isn't that an invisible hand guiding that sailboat? :-P
I don't know Tim, that seems like an awful lot of work. I'm more of a Mike Rounds, "that's just to hard" kind of guy.