Hampered by a slowdown in federal spending, Maryland came in dead last in the nation for its pace of job creation over the past year, shedding almost 1 percent of its employment base — nearly 20,000 positions — the U.S. Department of Labor reported.
The figures released Friday show declines in Maryland in eight of the past 12 months. Twenty-two states added jobs during the past year.
The preliminary report, which could be revised, isn't uniformly bad. The Labor Department's survey of households suggests that more Marylanders are working, either by finding employment out of state or by starting new businesses, neither of which would show up in the separate jobs count.
About 25,000 more Marylanders were working in May than were a year earlier, gains made largely in recent months.
The unemployment rate has trended downward as a result, from 7.4 percent in May 2010 to 6.8 percent last month. The rate was unchanged from April.
But that doesn't negate the job-creation problem facing Maryland. The state weathered the recession better than the nation as a whole, but it is now dealing with slowdowns and cutbacks to federal agencies and contractors — a key part of the regional economy — on top of a lackluster national recovery.
4 comments:
All this as O'Malley says the opposite!
Off course O'Malley is going to tout that unemployment in Maryland is going down.
Afterall - when the 26 weeks of Maryland unemployment benefits + 22 weeks of Federal unemployment extension + Congress's last federal unemployment extension - (due to severity of recession) are exhaused - the Maryland recipients are going to eventually fall out of the system.
Bottom line - O'Malley says that unemployment has fallen - when in effect - the people who have fallen out of the system are still unemployed and now unaccounted for.
It is all smoke and mirrors. What a scandrel.
not surprised,
but am embarassed.
maryland is awful anymore.
Hey- lets raise tolls !!
that'll fix everything.....
If only those welfare folks would get a job.
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