Tuesday, March 7, 2017

Not the "gold standard" - Wisconsin wages and jobs figures suck again

A few quick reactions from the release of today's "gold standard" Quarterly Census on Employment and Wages, beyond being 32nd in the nation for private sector job growth from September 2015 to September 2016. As usual, I highly recommend checking out the always handy QCEW interactive map to break down the data in a variety of manners.

First of all, Wisconsin again lagged most of our Midwestern neighbors, including being well behind our Dem-voting neighbors west of the St. Croix.

Private sector job growth, Sept 2015-Sept 2016
Mich +2.10%
Ind. +1.95%
Minn +1.65%
Ohio +1.07%
Wis. +1.05%
Iowa +0.73%
Ill. +0.69%

Even worse, Wisconsin was at or near the bottom when it came to manufacturing employment and wages, one year after right-to-work (for less) was passed into law in the state. Again, note the contrast with job-gaining Minnesota, a state that is not right-to-work and pays its workers. Ugh more than Wisconsin.

Manufacturing employment change Sept 2015-Sept 2016
Mich +11,305
Ind. +1,340
Minn +1,228
Ohio -1,720
Iowa -2,327
Wis. -4,034
I'll. -8,526

Average weekly manufacturing wage, Sept 2016
Ill. $1,279
Minn $1,268
Mich $1,219
Ind. $1,123
Ohio $1,123
Iowa $1,076
Wis. $1,071

Hey, WMC and MMAC! I think I found your wage skills gap! It's with the oligarchs not understanding that they have to pay a market value to get more workers.

Oh, and while you business oligarchs are at it, maybe you should learn something from those hippies in Dane County about how to grow jobs. Because Dane County added 3 TIMES as many jobs as any other county in the state, and added almost as many jobs as a combined 66 of 72 counties in the state.

Private sector job growth, Sept 2015-Sept 2016
Dane County +8,015
Kenosha Co. +2,640
Winnebago Co. +1,908
Outagamie +1,539
Waukesha Co. +1,459
Brown Co. +1,440
OTHER 66 COUNTIES COMBINED +8,561

But please, Gov Walker. Tell us how us folks in Madison don't get it. And keep trying to convince the rubes that this flailing, trailing state is in great shape. Because reality speaks a wholly different story, and shows yet again that it is well past time to put this Koch/Bradley trickle-down austerity garbage into the dustbin.
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4 comments:

  1. Jake formerly of the LPMarch 8, 2017 at 12:32 PM

    By the way read Chris Walker at Political Heat for more on the QCEW numbers, including the 5-year view (that we also suck in)

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  2. ChuckMarch 8, 2017 at 1:54 PM

    Am I reading that interactive chart wrong? It looks like Brown Co. *increased* manufacturing, while "Information" (which I read as tech) went in the shitter?

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    Replies
    1. Jake formerly of the LPMarch 8, 2017 at 5:21 PM

      I think you're correct, Chuck. The bigger losses were in "professional and business services", which lost over 800 jobs in Brown County over the year measured.

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  3. ChuckMarch 8, 2017 at 5:41 PM

    Thanks for the clarification. It's strange to me--on campus here there's all this talk about "Information" jobs...but the data tells a different story. And I wonder how many "health profession" jobs are really data entry at Aurora or something similar.

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