Leading the nation, but leaving many behind
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Like a rocket suddenly leaving the launch pad after a long countdown, the Pittsburgh region's economy surged forward last fall with unprecedented job growth.
In September, the region still had 7,000 fewer jobs than before the recession began and more than 9,000 fewer jobs than in 2000. But just one month later, the exact opposite was true -- there were more jobs in the Pittsburgh region in October than any October in history. We had 14,900 more jobs in October than in September, 23,100 more than a year earlier and 2,500 more than in October 2008, in the middle of the recession.
This job growth was not just a national wave that Pittsburgh was lucky enough to ride. The region actually led the nation in job growth in October with the largest percentage of increases in both total jobs and private sector jobs of any major region in the country.
The job surge wasn't a temporary phenomenon, either. Preliminary figures for December indicate that another 1,400 net new jobs were added between October and December, pushing the job count to the highest level in history. Over the 12 months ending in December 2011, Pittsburgh had the fourth-highest rate of job growth of any region in the country.
Which businesses should we thank for this remarkable turnaround?
The total number of jobs always increases in the fall because of a variety of seasonal factors, so you have to look closely to see what's really going on. Most of the new jobs were created in sectors such as health care and higher education, where we've become accustomed to seeing growth, but we also saw better-than-typical growth in the retail sector.
Our economic success in the fall was also helped by an industry that didn't add any jobs at all -- the leisure and hospitality sector (which includes arts, sports, restaurants, bars and hotels). Although there were 200 fewer jobs in the leisure and hospitality sector in October than the month before, that's actually good news because in every other year for the past 20 years, that sector has lost between 1,400 and 4,800 jobs in October because of seasonal layoffs. The leisure and hospitality sector ended the year with more jobs than any December in history, helping to boost regional job totals.
First Published February 7, 2012 12:10 pm
