Editor's Note: January marks a new phase in our journalism. Due to the merger between WUIS and Illinois Issues, we now have a number of journalists that enable reporting on a beat model. A beat allows a reporter to learn events and people more thoroughly than general assignment reporting. Each reporter is focusing on key issues in the state. We're calling it the "Illinois Issues Initiative."
ILLINOIS ECONOMY Bill Wheelhouse
Decatur has been the unfortunate standard bearer for unemployment in Illinois. Because of a manufacturing exodus over the years, the Soy City is often atop the list of the worst metro unemployment rates in the state.
Recently Decatur showed the biggest unemployment drop in the nation. In the course of a year, the unemployment rate dropped by 3.1 percent. The August jobless rate in Decatur was 9.4 percent, compared to an August 2013 rate of 12.5 percent. The Bureau of Labor Statistics’ numbers showed 4,900 people listed as unemployed compared to more than 6,000 counted as out of work last year in the Decatur area. Unfortunately, hardly any new jobs were created. The actual number of people working is about the same as it was a year prior. There are fewer people actively seeking work. The shift in numbers was the result of the eligible workforce shrinking rather than any great economic revival.
These numbers come out each month, but they only tell part of the story. That is the problem with numbers thrown out in the news, during election campaigns or to tout a stance on legislation: they only frame a portion of the bigger economic picture.
I plan to put that picture into focus with special attention to jobs and the economic recovery.
It’s not hard to find people frustrated with the pace of the current economic recovery. It is taking time to emerge from a downturn that picked up the name The Great Recession.
Both critics and defenders of the speed of the recovery agree that it could continue for another five to seven years. If JP Morgan Chase Bank economist Jim Glassman is correct in the prediction that the Illinois recovery is only in the “middle innings,” I will track the second half of the ballgame as it relates to Illinois.
The implications of the recovery matter more than just a return to full-time work for someone who has been involuntarily working part time. Illinois’ progress out of its economic slump helps determine how the state can meet its obligations and what kind of services it can provide, especially given that state government budgets never really recovered from a previous recession in 2001.
Tracking the Illinois recovery means following the new employment and business trends unique to the state. Who are the workers that are missing out and what might be the policy implications to deal with both cause and effect? It also means alerting people to possible speed bumps on that road to recovery.
It means putting a spotlight on the indicators that help us keep tabs on economic progress or decline. I will explain those indicators and pan for nuggets of information gold along the way as I focus on how the citizens and the governments across the state try to recover.
