Is job growth as bad as the data say?

• Position: Brief Article

The Indiana economy has been slowing down all year, according to the data on payroll employment at business establishments. The figures put the job total at 2.99 million workers in October, only about 20,000 jobs ahead of its level for the same month one year earlier. This is a mere 0.7 percent gain in employment statewide, down sharply from the 2.1 percent job growth enjoyed by the state in 1998.

But is this in fact what is happening? It is hard to know. If you look up the words written here 12 months ago, you will find similar concerns voiced about the pace of state job growth reported at that time. Those concerns were rendered moot by the substantial revisions made by the statisticians at the Indiana Department of Workforce Development early this year, which transformed what had previously thought to be stagnation into very respectable growth.

Such revisions are a fact of life in the world of regional economics. Lethargic job growth was also shown in preliminary figures for 1997, which were restated to depict the economy as much more healthy than previously thought.

These revisions force us to adopt a more cautious attitude toward the dour job growth news reported for most of this year.

Latest Previous Year Period Period Ago Employment (000) U.S. Oct. 99 129,296.0 128,986.0 126,567.0 Indiana Oct. 99 2,988.0 2,977.1 2,968.5 Manufacturing Employment (000) U.S. Oct. 99 18,349.0 18,364.0 18,686.0 Indiana Oct. 99 687.9 688.0 685.6 Non-manufacturing Employment (000) U.S. Oct...