CT Employment: First the Good News

A January 17 post to the CT Business and Industry Association’s (CBIA) website proclaims that private sector job growth in the state is at its strongest in two decades. According to the CT Department of Labor’s monthly jobs report, 1,600 private sector jobs were added in the month of December alone. The CBIA post goes on to note that overall in 2018, Connecticut added 23,100 jobs, the best performance since 2006. At the same time, the unemployment rate has fallen to 4 percent, its lowest since April, 2002.

The CBIA warns that this is preliminary data and it may be revised as of the Department of Labor’s in final report in March. What’s striking, though, is where Connecticut stacks up compared to neighboring states. Looked at through the lens of post-recession job recovery (February, 2010 through December, 2018), CT has recovered 93 percent of jobs lost in the recession. This result does not compare favorably with other New England states, which have seen triple-digit job recovery rates – up to 397 percent, or the US as a whole.

We know that jobs in many sectors, particularly in manufacturing, go begging. That’s why we will continue to fund programs that promote job education as a way of creating economic stability for low- and moderate-income CT wage earners.

Read the post at CBIA