Director's Blog

Monday, March 9, 2009

The Texas Workforce Commission issued their employment report for January today (available at the Texas Labor Market Review). It indicates a pretty dramatic jump in unemployment in San Antonio from 5.3% to 6.3% (not seasonally adjusted). As you can see in the graphics, the decline in employment is broad based with all industries showing a decline in employment. Overall, employment declined 2.22% in San Antonio from December 2008 to January 2009 with retail experiencing the largest decline at 3.83%.

It is worth noting that on a seasonally adjusted basis, unemployment increased from 5.6% in December to 5.9% in January. The decrease from 6.3% to 5.9% with the seasonal adjustment is probably due to a downward adjustment of the retail decline. Either way, these are some pretty sizable increases, but it is interesting that San Antonio now has the lowest unemployment rate among the 4 major metro economies. On a seasonally adjusted basis, the unemployment rates in these economies are as follows:

San Antonio = 5.9%
Houston = 6.1%
Austin = 5.9%
Dallas/Ft. Worth = 6.7%

Given the broad-based decline and the size of the increase, it seems to me that these numbers indicate that San Antonio is now feeling the full force of the global recession and will continue to do so for the next few months at least.

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If you would like more information about the SABÉR Research Institute, please contact: Steve Nivin, Ph.D., Director and Chief Economist (210) 639-5587 snivin@stmarytx.edu steven@sahcc.org