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The Marshfield‑Wood County economy saw its
industrial sector employment rise 1.1 percent from last year.
Moreover, the unemployment rate dropped to a very low 3.8
percent.
Marshfield
payrolls are estimated to have grown by 3.5 percent from last
year. Retailers have indicated the Christmas selling season was
moderately better than the one in 1993. Help walled advertising,
another indicator, continues to explode upwards, this time by 21
percent. On the negative side of the ledger, unemployment claims
rose and residential construction hit the skids on count of
higher interest rates.
Wood
County's
industrial sector employment picture improved slightly from
Fourth Quarter 1993 (Table 7). The number
of jobs increased by 472, rising from 41,950 to 42,422.
Manufacturing services, and construction expanded by 2.8, 7.3,
and 10.0 percent respectively. In contrast to this good
performance were the contractions in trade and government
employment, falling by 8.0 and 4.2 percent. The CWERB employment
index estimates that
Marshfield
payrolls expanded by 3.5 percent.
Retailer confidence survey for
Marshfield is
given in Table 8. Our panel of merchants
indicated that store sales and traffic were somewhat better than
a year ago. The marks of 82 and 58 for December were about at
the same levels as those of September. We then asked our kcal
merchants to forecast store sales and traffic three months from
now compared to a year ago. The responses were almost in the
neutral category. The marks of 55 and 58 were also decidedly
lower than those given in September 1994.
The CWERB help wanted advertising index shot
upwards by 37 points, from 178 to 213
(Table
9). This 21.0 percent surge In advertising activity helped to sustain the
upward trend in this series. Since earner 1992 the seasonally
adjusted time series has been trending sharply upward. This
surge, besides reflecting kcal labor market conditions suggests
that firms outside the area are looking for skilled workers in
Marshfield.
Either way this barometer tells of an improvement in
opportunities for our local people.
Public assistance claims in
Marshfield were
not available from government sources at the time of this report
(Table
10).
The CWERB plans to pursue this unfortunate situation and will
attempt to include this data in the future. Data for
unemployment claims is presented in Table 11.
On a weekly average basis new claims rose from 51 to 93 and
total claims increased from 128 to 185 in a year over
comparison. The rise in total claims this quarter masks the
longer term trend in these figures. Since First Quarter 1992 the
time series has been trending lower, acknowledging that a few
brief upward fluctuations have taken place in the series.
Higher Interest rates have placed a damper on
residential construction activity in
Marshfield
(Table
12).
Residential permits issued, their estimated value, the number of
housing units, residential alteration permits, and their value
fell by 44, 43, 57, 24 and 70 percent from last year.
Much better news comes from nonresidential
construction activity
(Table
13). The number of permits issued was 7 with an estimated value of $16.7
million. More good news is that business alteration permits
totaled 22 with an estimated value of $791.3 thousand. Even
though percentage changes are not given because of the volatile
nature of business investment, it can still be said without
hesitation that Fourth Quarter 1994 results were very good.
Table 14 displays
financial statistics for the
Marshfield
area. The numbers for Fourth Quarter 1993 and 1994 are not
comparable due to a rash of bank merger activity in 1994. The
numbers for deposits and loans win become compatible next year,
now that a new base line has been established for each series in
1994. Until that time the financial statistics will just be
reported without commentary. Post merger bank deposits in our
sample was $519.4 million and bank lending was $383.8 million.
Clark County
data is presented in Table 15 and
Table 16. This economic information is
provided because Clark County is an important market area for
Marshfield area businesses. |
