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Unemployment
rates are generally lower throughout the region while total employment is
generally higher than in June 2002. Industrial
sector employment figures show that employment performance was uneven among
the categories. Manufacturing,
while declining by only 100 positions, continues to be a source of concern
over the long-term. Business
confidence rebounded. Surprisingly,
there is more optimism expressed about the national economy than for the local
economy. This is the first time
in memory that this has happened in the survey.
Unemployment
rates are presented in Table 2.
The unemployment rates for Marathon and Wood counties declined from a
year ago. The unemployment rate
in June for Marathon was 4.5 percent and 5.9 percent for Wood.
Portage County, however, experienced an increase in its unemployment
rate. The rate for Portage rose
from 5.3 percent to 5.6 percent over the past twelve months.
Similarly the unemployment rate for the state and nation increased over
the past year. For Wisconsin the
unemployment rate is estimated to be 5.7 percent, and the U.S. rate at 6.5
percent.
Some
very good news is reported for total employment (Table 3).
All geographical areas experienced an increase in total employment.
Marathon, Portage, and Wood employment increased by 3.0, 1.1, and 3.3
percent respectively. In addition, central Wisconsin employment rose from 148.2
thousand to 152.1 thousand from June of 2002, a nice gain of 2.6 percent.
Likewise, over the past twelve months Wisconsin added 2.3 percent, and
the U.S. 0.9 percent to their respective employment totals.
A
detailed listing of industrial sector employment is given in Table
4. Industrial sector employment data indicates that total
nonfarm employment grew by 0.9 percent from a year ago in Marathon, Portage
and Wood counties. The sector
experiencing the largest gain was leisure and hospitality with a reported gain
of 1,000 positions. The sector
experiencing the largest decline over the past twelve months was trade.
Retail and wholesale trade positions declined by an estimated 600 jobs
since June 2002.
County
sales tax collection are collected by the state and distributed back to the
counties (Table 5).
Portage County's sales tax collections expanded from $1.04 million to
$1.09 million or by 5.1 percent over the course of the year.
After many strong quarters of revenue increases it is estimated that
Marathon county sales tax collections fell slightly from $2.41 million to
$2.36 million, a decline of about 2.3 percent.
Given the strong growth that has taken place in Marathon county's
retail sector, it's not surprising that there would be an occasional period
when receipts did not match the previous year's activity level.
The
figure in Table 5A shows how the unemployment has trended
in central Wisconsin over the past five years.
Clearly the trend has been upward.
Also the reader can also easily see how rate fluctuates from season to
season in central Wisconsin.
Table 5B contains the movement and trend of total
employment in our three county area.
The sharp decline in the year 2001 corresponds to the worse part of the
recent recession.
Business
confidence information is garnered from the CWERB's business survey of area
business executives (Table 6).
The data shows a significant rebound in confidence from the March time
frame. Four of the five questions
are at higher level than in March. Recent
changes at the national level are thought to be positive.
Though better than March, recent changes indicate little improvement
has taken place in the local economy. For
one of the few times since the CWERB started collecting this information, this
group believes that the national economy will improve more than their
particular industry and the local economy in the quarters ahead.
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