Iowa Jobs Fall in November
Iowa Policy Project
Recovery Pace Lags Three Years After Recession

MOUNT VERNON, Iowa (Dec. 16, 2004) -- Iowa's nonfarm jobs dropped by 1,500 in November after a slow four-month climb, while the state's unemployment rate fell slightly to 4.7 percent as 4,000 people left the state's labor market.

The November numbers showed 1,455,100 nonfarm jobs, down from the 12-month high of 1,456,600 posted the month before, but up 10,100 from a year earlier. The number is up 2,900 from November 2001, at the end of the last recession, and down 19,100 from the March 2001 start of that recession.

Despite that context, Iowa Workforce Development Director Richard Running claimed in the agency's monthly report that Iowa "remains in a recovery mode" three years after the 2001 recession.

"That's overstating things a bit," said Peter Fisher, research director at the nonpartisan Iowa Policy Project. "Iowa has spent a lot of these three years lagging well behind any meaningful recovery pace from the recession.

"Even now, we are still over 19,000 jobs behind the more pertinent measure - where Iowa stood at the start of the recession. That number shows what kind of ground we need to make up."

Fisher noted Iowa would have to gain nearly 1,600 nonfarm jobs per month  over a year just to get back to where the state stood at the start of the 2001 recession. That compares with an average nonfarm job growth of 842 per month over the past 12 months.

"Over the next 12 months, we need to do almost twice as well as we did during the past 12 months," Fisher said. "We need a much stronger recovery than we've seen if the economy is going to offer sufficient job opportunities for Iowans still out of work or just entering the workforce.”

The 2,900-job growth since the 2001 recession also lags far behind the pace of the recovery from the 1990s recession. At the comparable 36-month mark following the March 1991 end of that recession, Iowa had gained 70,200 jobs.

Iowa's nonfarm job numbers hovered between 1,444,200 (June) and 1,456,600 (October) through the year.

The 12-month increase in jobs includes a 1,100 net increase in manufacturing, following a downturn in that sector in 2003. Financial activities with a 4,600 increase, education and health services at 4,200 and construction at 1,800 had the largest gains.

The only major declines cited by IWD came in government, 2,300, and information, 800.

Key numbers from Thursday's release:

--  Iowa's unemployment rate stood at 4.7 percent, down slightly from 4.8 percent in October but up slightly from 4.6 percent in November 2003.

--  Iowa's nonfarm jobs stood at 1,455,100 in November, down from 1,456,600 in October and up 10,100 jobs, from 1,445,000, in November 2003.

--  Iowa's labor force stood at 1,631,600 in November, with 4,000 fewer people working or looking for work than in October. The number is up significantly, however, from the 1,603,000 labor force figure in November 2003.

--  The nonfarm job total is 27,200 short of the 47,000 promised to be created from June 2003 to November 2004 under the federal "Jobs and Growth" tax cut.

Three years after the end of the 2001 recession:

--  Iowa has 2,900 more jobs.

--  Iowa's unemployment rate is up a full percentage point, to 4.7 percent from 3.7 percent.