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A summary of this section of the
report is as follows.
Industrial sector employment fell by 0.6 percent
from last year; the retailer confidence index
for Marshfield indicates modest improvement will
take place in the retail sector; help wanted advertising has improved; public
assistance claims and unemployment claims declined from fourth quarter 2006
levels; residential construction permits were very low in late 2007;
nonresidential construction was at about the same level as a year ago; and
lastly, Clark County’s economy expanded over the past twelve months.
Table 7 represents the state’s
employment estimates that are based on a survey of establishments.
Total nonfarm employment contracted by 200 positions
or by 0.6 from a year ago.
Construction & natural resources and government
employment contracted the most, by 12.3 percent and 21.5 percent respectively.
The other seven sectors in Table 7 experienced
growth.
Even manufacturing, which has seen tough times, grew by an
estimated 200 jobs or 2.9 percent.
The information & business services sector improved
the most, adding 400 jobs over the past twelve months.
Table 8 gives the CWERB survey results of
local merchants.
When asked about total sales compared to last year
they thought matters were slightly ahead of last year’s pace.
However, store traffic was thought to be somewhat
lower.
When asked to forecast expected sales and traffic three
months from now, they indicated that sales and traffic would be slightly
improved over 2007 levels.
Help wanted advertising in Table 9 shows
that it improved a bit from last year’s mark.
Meanwhile the U.S.
figure declined rather sharply.
Even though newspaper advertising only accounts for
a small part of the total amount of jobs available, economists still believe it
to be a reliable predictor of future labor market activity and of the future
direction of unemployment rates.
The data in Table 10 and
Table 11 give us some sense as to the level of local
family financial distress.
Table 10 shows that public assistance on a monthly
average fell from 82 to 66 over the past twelve months.
Over the same period Table 11 shows that the number
of new unemployment claims contracted by 3.4 percent.
Similarly, total unemployment claims declined by 4.8
percent in
Wood
County.
Residential construction activity in Table 12
shows that alteration activity outpaced home construction.
The number of new permits fell from just 6 to 4 and
their estimated value fell from $2.2 to $1.3 million over the year.
However, the number of residential alteration
permits climbed from 13 to 17 or nearly 31 percent.
The associated value of this activity increased from
$174.7 to $246.7 thousand or by 41.2 percent over the year.
Nonresidential construction saw 3 projects taking place in fourth
quarter 2007.
The estimated value was $545 thousand (Table
13).
The number of business alteration permits reached 30 in
fourth quarter 2007.
These alteration projects were valued at $2.3
million.
In sum, it appears there was little overall change in
nonresidential activity between 2006 and 2007.
Table 14 and
Table 15 present
Clark
County
economic statistics.
Total nonfarm employment grew by 6.8 percent or 700
jobs since fourth quarter 2006.
Except for financial activities, leisure &
hospitality, and government, all other sectors registered gains in their
employment totals.
Clark
County’s unemployment
rate fell from 5.9 to 5.4 percent and the total number of people employed
expanded from 16,965 to 17,189 or by 1.3 percent since fourth quarter 2006.
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