Washington state’s economy has been doing quite well over the past year, but there are some chinks in the armor starting to show now. There’s no reason to panic, but there are some causes for concern to keep an eye on.
Here are Five Fast Facts about the latest state jobs report:
- ⬇️🚫That’s The Wrong Direction! Washington state actually lost 2,300 jobs in May, primarily in the retail and professional services sectors. The last time we lost jobs overall was January 2021. You know, a lifetime ago before the COVID vaccine was widely available.
- ⬇️👍This Is The Good Kind Of Down - The seasonally adjusted unemployment rate dropped to 3.9% (from 4.1% in April), but is still behind the national average of 3.6%. That’s great(ish)!
- 📜🧮The Bigger Picture - While the leisure and hospitality sectors added more jobs than any other (2,400), we are still almost 22,000 jobs behind pre-pandemic employment levels overall. Ugh, sometimes historical perspective does NOT help.
- 🐢🐌What’s The Downer? The economy is a complex thing, and there are a number of things slowing it down. The biggest ones are a lack of new Fed pandemic stimulus money and rising interest rates. Wait, what?? The gravy train has to end?
- 💰☝️The Silver Lining - The state’s average annual salary increased by 7.5%, up to $83k, and all sectors saw salary growth overall from 2021. The best growth was in leisure and hospitality, which went up by 14.2%! Transportation (up 7.6%) and retail (up 6.5%) also saw salaries improve a lot. We would encourage celebration, but inflation.
🔥Bottom line: We’ve been on a good run, and there are still some very bright spots. We’ll take any job growth we can get, and we’ll REALLY take higher salaries, too! But without Fed money, things are definitely getting tight, and we’re starting to feel the pinch now. Here’s hoping our elected leaders make good choices about priorities and spending, and help sustain the growth that we’ve seen over the last few months. Surely we can trust our politicians to do the right thing…right?? 🤞
Are you feeling the job crunch, or the silver lining?
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