Blue Mass Group

Reality-based commentary on politics.

Surprisingly good news on unemployment: MA doing way better than the rest of the U.S.

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Wow.

The Massachusetts unemployment rate fell last month for the first time in more than two years, plunging nearly a half-percentage point as employers trimmed payrolls by just 900 jobs, the state Executive Office of Labor and Workforce Development reported today. The state jobless rate dropped to 8.9 percent in October from 9.3 percent in September, the first decline since June 2007. The surprising decrease bucked the national trend, which saw the US unemployment rate soar into the double digit for the first time since the early 1980s, hitting 10.2 percent.

The news isn’t good across the board, but is perhaps unexpectedly broad — particularly the construction numbers.

In Massachusetts, manufacturing, retail, financial services, and other sectors continued to cut jobs, but most of those losses were offset by strong gains in two of the state’s key employment sectors: professional and business services, and education and health services. The beleaguered construction industry even added 100 jobs, the first gain since February.

Great news for MA, and of course, great news for Governor Patrick.  If these numbers hold up going forward, and MA continues recovering and actually decreasing unemployment ahead of the rest of the country, his opponents’ easiest argument becomes a whole lot harder to make.

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Comments

  1. Politically, this doesn’t do the Governor a bit of good if people don’t know it or feel it in their own lives.

    • What these numbers do not reflect are trends in wage deflation, and cutbacks in hours. These numbers do not reflect trends in health/dental insurance premium hikes, hikes in co-pays, and hikes in deductibles. These numbers do not reflect 401K value loss, the hike in the sales tax, hikes in property taxes compelled by the Governor’s cutbacks, and increased fees for nearly every service.

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      p>Jobless or not, if folks in the next election ask themselves how their standard of living has improved since the last election – then they will likely say that it has NOT, and that Governor Patrick’s policies have exacerbated their problems.

      • Really? I’d like to see the evidence of that. If you really think the Governor’s policies have exacerbated the situation in this state, then it would logically follow that we are in a worse situation than most other states. So show me the money numbers.

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        p>Having said that, I do agree that Patrick is in trouble due to the economy. Not because anything he’s done has worsened the situation, but merely because people vote with their wallets and their hearts. They don’t critically examine the situation and compare Massachusetts to other states. They just say “things suck; I think a new Governor is in order.”

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        p>They do, as you say, “ask themselves how their standard of living has improved since the last election” – and it hasn’t. So Patrick will be held accountable for that rather than commended for any actions he may have taken that moderated the situation.

        • Everyone understands the situation. Yes, we are in the middle of a recession, that’s your reason to vote for someone else for Governor?

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          p>Deval Patrick caused the recession?  No.  As you have noted.  It’s how had Patrick responded to the crisis.  How do we stack up against other states?  The answer is pretty favorably, high ranked business climate, noted over the past several months that we are ahead of the curve for jobs and showing signs of bottoming out.  Budget crisis handled well in comparison to other states.

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          p>What would another candidate have done differently and what would that impact be?  Because right now, we are ahead of others.  

        • http://vps28478.inmotionhosting.com/~bluema24/s…

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          p>I noted before how this Democratic administration and legislature could easily have worked to balance the budget without compelling evisceration of public education, enacting more regressive taxation, or going out of their way to make sure that the most vulnerable of our citizens die from neglect or starvation. What this Governor has done is hideous.

          • All of the other candidates (Mihos, Baker, Cahill) are falling all over themselves to disavow the modest increase in the sales tax that was passed.  At least this Governor signed off on a revenue increase.  

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            p>I would have liked to see an income tax increase instead, and enough of one that some of the recent cuts would not have been necessary, but those decisions are made by the legislature and the lege did not support doing anything with the income tax.  To the Governor’s credit, he at least supported the new revenues the lege was prepared to pass, without which this very tough year would have been even worse.

            • Where was his bully pulpit?

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              p>I, together with all of my party’s candidates, pointed out how $2 billion in revenue could have been raised without touching the state income tax.

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              p>The Governor, however, never once even attempted to discuss these measures. Where was his support for those? Yes, it is ultimately up to the legislature —

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              p>Yet this is a Governor who has been entirely too comfortable pretending that we lack resources, and that our main problem is too few regressive taxes.

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              p>Remember, this is a Governor who has challenged critics of his cuts to find revenue sources elsewhere. Well, we have — and he runs away from it.

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              p>He doesn’t want to plug the holes.

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              p>He wants to gut the ship.

                • He’s a “technocrat,” a neo-liberal in the tradition of Silber, Tsongas and Duffey. Yes, he hopes to gut the ship.

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                  p>I see the slashing of local aid as no mere coincidence from a Governor who pledged his support as a candidate to charter schools, MCAS as a graduation requirement, merit pay for teachers and other lovely Pioneer Institute ambitions.

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                  p>I see the continued demolition of health care for the needy to be once again no mere coincidence from a Governor who castigates young people for failing to purchase health insurance that they just cannot afford even now.

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                  p>These are the cuts of a neo-liberal, in pursuit of the goals of a neo-liberal — and the neo-liberal ambition is simply just not one that would be realized as effectively were he to champion the revenue measures in front of his nose.

                • Plus, this Governor also advocated and won on local options taxes, giving cities and towns more flexibility to raise needed revenues.

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                  p>I’m not always getting the priorities represented in what’s cut vs. what’s spared – the Governor could clearly be doing a better job of communicating – but I see no evidence of a desire to get rid of worthy programs or lack of empathy for those affected by their loss.  The Governor has even made a point of reminding town hall audiences that every state job cut is an unemployed neighbor.
                   

                • Of course I remember his embrace of regressive taxation.

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                  p>Regressive taxation in no way solves the problem, of course, but is the universal prescription of neo-liberal policy. It’s the next best thing to user fees as we march down the pot-hole ridden road of the privatization of everything.

                • and candy & soda and using those revenues to fund cessation and public education campaigns to discourage those products use are standard public health strategies.

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                  p>Whenever anybody indignantly pointed out that tobacco taxes are regressive and disproportionately affect poor people  I had a simple answer —

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                  p>Yeah – so’s cancer. And obesity. And alcoholism.  

                • How much of the tobacco tax increases (and court awards) have actually been spent on “cessation and public education campaigns”? The experience with the tobacco tax increases of 1992, as documented in this 2001 study, are symptomatic of what actually happens far too often (emphasis mine):

                  During the first budget year, programmes mentioned by the initiative that were not exclusively tobacco related accounted for 27% of total Question 1 expenditures, while 50% of the revenues were allocated for programmes that were neither mentioned by the initiative nor provided any tobacco education, prevention, and cessation services.

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                  p>Please understand that I’m not opposing these “sin taxes”. I do think, however, that public policy will be better served by imposing increased taxes on the wealthiest five percent of Massachusetts residents, rather than continually targeting the admittedly bad habits of our poorest fifty percent.

                • You are correct, lots of states did rip off/are still ripping off the tobacco settlement money, and putting it all in the General Fund, including Massachusetts.  

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                  p>And I agree we should figure out how to tax the people who have wealth and who can afford to pay more.

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                  p>Meanwhile so many  studies have proven that increased tax increases on tobacco do deter folk from buying cigarettes it’s almost boring. Most especially teens. And a buck increase of a pack of cigaretts is often a trigger for adults to quit and find some of those state sponsored tobacco cessation prograsm. I think cigaretts are over $7.00 a pack here.  

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                  p>The recent report about the success of even the much reduced Massachusetts program front paged here, points out that offering tobacco cessation programs to MassHealth recipients produced some real concrete savings in less heart attacks, fewer premature births etc etc.    

                • Yeah – so’s cancer. And obesity. And alcoholism.

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                  p>Unfortunately, the taxes have no deterrent effect —  and too many folks struggling who happen to be very much injured by these regressive taxes are dissuaded thereby from seeking the treatment that they need.

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                  p>Sin taxes do not diminish demand. Behavior modification is not the purpose. Sin taxes are not directly funding treatment or rehabilitation, either. Regressive revenue generation is its sole purpose.

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                  p>A state concerned about sweets would not allow for sweets to be dispensed from vending machines in public schools.

  2. State House News Service

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    p>

    DESPITE JOB LOSSES, UNEMPLOYMENT RATE DIPS: Massachusetts lost 900 more jobs in October, state officials reported Thursday morning, but the state’s unemployment rate dropped to 8.9 percent from 9.3 percent.    Government gained 200 jobs over the month, with 1,000 added jobs at that level due largely to the hiring Census workers. State government shed 700 job in October and local government dropped 100, according to the Executive Office of Labor and Workforce Development.  During 2009, government jobs are down 9,900 with 4,000 jobs lost in state government, a 5,300 job decline in local government jobs and and 600 fewer federal government jobs in Massachusetts, state officials reported.   Overall, jobs in Massachusetts are   down 101,500 or 3.1 percent from one year ago.

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    p>Here’s the Governor’s press release that in turn links us to other resources and reports.

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    p>Here’s the Boston Business Journal

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    p>Here’s da Globe

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    p>And the Herald that actually quoted the Governor.

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    p>

    “The numbers are moving in the right direction the and the growth has come in the sectors that we’ve concentrated on: IT, health care, the innovation sectors,” he said. “Obviously, 8.9 percent, though lower than 9.3 percent, is still high and we have lots of work to do to continue to create jobs and create an atmosphere where companies want to invest in growth.”  

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