JOB WATCH: Employment Since the End of the Recession

May 8th, 2012

Last week the jobs report revealed that the U.S. added a modest 115,000 in April 2012. The nation’s unemployment rate ticked down slightly to 8.1%. While Mississippi’s employment numbers have not been released yet for April, this post reviews longer-term trends in jobs across the state.

From the beginning to the end of the recession, Mississippi lost 5.5% of all its jobs, equal to approximately 64,000 jobs. Since the recession ended in June 2009, job loss has tempered, but Mississippi has still seen overall employment fall by 0.5% (see chart).

In comparison, the United States saw overall employment decline by 5.4% during the recession, and total employment has risen by 1.8% since June 2009. The disparities in job growth since the end of the recession signal that Mississippi’s recovery is progressing slower than the nation. Mississippi also trails the South overall where employment has expanded by 2.4% since the summer of 2009.

Additionally, the state’s job market in 2011 now appears to be weaker than originally projected. Data on Mississippi’s overall employment shows Mississippi’s employment down slightly from a year ago.

A more extended look at Mississippi’s employment history underscores that substantial job additions have not occurred since the recession ended, and Mississippi falls behind the region and nation which are experiencing weak growth. The findings also illustrate that thousands of Mississippi families continue to seek resources in the wake of job loss and financial hardship. Calls to cut critical programs like SNAP, as highlighted in last week’s post, risk further harming workers and families who have lost jobs and are struggling to find employment in communities across the state.

Author: Sarah Welker, Policy Analyst
Source: Bureau of Labor Statistics. Current Establishment Survey. Jobs in thousands.