You wouldn?t know this from reading Gov. Mike Easley?s press release about Friday?s estimated job growth in North Carolina during July ? the preliminary projection is 8,200 ? but the big news was the Bureau of Labor Statistics? significant downward revision in North Carolina?s job gain for June. Last month, it was suggested that the state had added about 35,400 jobs in June. But as Don Carrington reported over at Carolina Journal Online, the number reflected errors in how the agency is dealing with seasonal adjustments in an era of early school starts and year-round calendars, among other problems.
Now BLS is reporting that North Carolina added about 11,600 jobs in June. Suddenly, 20,000 jobs supposedly created have simply gone ?poof.?
But Easley?s spin ? which is kind of like President Bush?s on the national level, admittedly ? is that even a small gain is still a gain, and that North Carolina has now been adding jobs consistently since January.
OK. But so what? The longer-term trend is the point. North Carolina?s recovery from the 2001 recession was slower and weaker than the rest of the nation?s recovery. We?ve still lost far more jobs since 2000, in numbers and percentage terms, than any other Southern state.
The governor does have an explanation: ?We are beginning to overcome some of the harm caused by national trade policies.? Ah, the flat-economic-earth argument returns.
