Who's Getting Ahead This Labor Day?
Chuck Sheketoff
Even though Oregon has one of the best performing economies in the nation, this Labor Day Oregon’s workers have too few opportunities to improve their economic status.
Who’s getting ahead in Oregon’s hot economy? Not enough of us according to the Oregon Center for Public Policy’s latest biennial look at Oregon’s economy. The OCPP’s new report, Who’s Getting Ahead? Opportunity in a Growing Economy, The State of Working Oregon 2006, is the first comprehensive look at the economic conditions facing workers in this period of strong economic growth.
Read the news release and order a report.
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12:49 p.m.
Sep 4, '06
“The highest-paid fifth of workers have reaped all of the real earnings gains since the recovery began,” he added. “Everyone else is slipping backwards.”
I don't understand. If middle-class jobs are being created, and they are, then how can all the gains be going to the top fifth?
6:20 p.m.
Sep 4, '06
Kari, I assume that's a rhetorical question. With the middle class falling behind (the median income, according to the press release, has slipped $73 since 1980), it doesn't matter if the jobs are plentiful. The wealth is being generated at the top.
Sep 4, '06
Chuck Sheketoff: Even though Oregon has one of the best performing economies in the nation, this Labor Day Oregon’s workers have too few opportunities to improve their economic status. JK: How do you justify that claim (one of the best performing economies) when Oregon ranks at the bottom in EMPLOYMENT, only 9 states have higher un-unemployment than we do: (from: http://www.bls.gov/web/laumstrk.htm )
41 OREGON___5.6 41 RHODE ISLAND __5.6 43 DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA 5.7 43 INDIANA___5.7 45 OHIO___5.8 46 TENNESSEE___5.9 47 SOUTH CAROLINA_6.2 48 KENTUCKY___6.3 49 ALASKA___7.0 49 MICHIGAN___7.0 51 MISSISSIPPI_____8.0
The good news: we beat Mississippi, Tennessee, Kentucky and South Carolina.
Just for fun lets look at that pillar of sprawl, dumb growth and bad land use policy: 28 GEORGIA____4.8
You don’t suppose Neil’s good friend, Teddy is the reason that “Oregon’s workers have too few opportunities to improve their economic status.”
Thanks JK
Sep 4, '06
My 2 cents- Oregon looks increasingly like a 3rd world economy to me. There is no corporate presence in Oregon, save for Nike, who doesnt pay very well for the majority of their workers. Timber is gone, Japan picked our pockets and left town after their tax breaks expired. Its pretty sad. Most college students who graduate here have no one to work for once they do. They have to save their future and move to another state, Cali has jobs, but you'll likely be renting for the rest of your life. Oregon needs to look to our tax code, income taxes need to go, replaced by sales taxes, capital gains taxes are the biggest job creation killer, ever. We have the highest in the nation. I really dont see the rosy scenario of great jobs going to all these wealthy people, they done seem to live here.
Sep 4, '06
Today I rode my bike around a lot of Portland, from Hawthorne to Hollywood to downtown to the Pearl and NW Portland. It struck me that it didn't seem much like a holiday. Almost all the shops were open and most of the bars and restaurants. It struck me that this is Labor Day, but most of our employment is now in the service and retail sectors, so most people had to work today.
So who was out shopping? I guess government employees, the underemployed, bankers and the wealthy. An interesting observation: Value Village was packed and Meier and Frank (excuse me, Macy's) wasn't, despite a huge sale.
The disappearing middle class is a national disaster, not limited to Oregon. There might be something our state government could do to reverse the national trend (secede?) but our land use and tax policies are not what's causing the decline in real income.
8:23 p.m.
Sep 4, '06
You don’t suppose Neil’s good friend, Teddy is the reason that “Oregon’s workers have too few opportunities to improve their economic status.”
Oregon was 50th out of 50 states for unemployment 3 years ago. Now we're 41st. Are you saying that the fact that Oregon has outpaced most other states in job creation over the last 5 years is a bad thing?
Here's the biggest problem that worker's are facing this labor day -- corporate profits are way up. Worker compensation is way down.
10:23 p.m.
Sep 4, '06
Here's some tidbits in response to some of the comments. Hopefully this will encourage you to order the report.
Since the peak of the last economic boom (November 2000 — the pre-recession high point for job numbers in Oregon) low-wage industries (those with jobs paying less than $30,000 per year on average) accounted for 63 percent of all net job growth in Oregon, although these industries as a group accounted for only 35 percent of all Oregon jobs.
Oregon’s average monthly unemployment rate has been above the national rate in all but five of the past 33 years. It has been more than 10 years since Oregon’s unemployment rate was lower than the national rate. Oregon’s unemployment rate is driven largely by factors that have little to do with how well the state’s economy is doing. The state unemployment rate should not be used as the barometer of Oregon’s economic success in isolation from other factors.
After bottoming out in July 2003, Oregon job numbers have trended steadily upward. Job growth in Oregon since that time ranks sixth fastest in the country.
Oregon’s economy is also doing well in terms of production as well as job growth. Growth in Oregon’s gross state product (GSP) outpaced total national GSP growth in 2004 and 2005. Oregon ranked seventh among states for GSP growth between 2003 and 2005, after ranking 49th between 2000 and 2003. Oregon’s share of nationwide GSP is now high by historical standards, having returned to levels achieved in the late 1970s and again in the late 1990s. There are indicators that 2006 is also a strong year.
Need to learn more? Order the report.
Sep 5, '06
I'm sure glad that OCPP opened the window to let a little breeze of reality sift into the ivory towers.
Sep 5, '06
Seems to me the jobs are related to the housing boom - which is a bubble. Once that goes, what is left?
Sep 5, '06
"Seems to me the jobs are related to the housing boom - which is a bubble. Once that goes, what is left?"
Oregon's economy is likely the most superficial and phony economies in the country.
A slow in the housing market and a slow down in government projects or government subsidized projects, (Urban renewal) along with a few Intel-like lay offs and Oregon will be first in the next recession.
Leftists have hobbled out State's ability to provide long lasting industrial middle class jobs long ago.
This current yammering of successes is laughable fantasy meant to dupe the public thorugh another election cycle.
If only everyone were a public employee,,,,,,,,
Sep 5, '06
For me, this discussion highlights the fact that construction industry jobs represent the last of the quality family wage jobs for those that are not in the executive or professional classes. In spite of this, how many times have you seen people, including many of us progressives, campaign against construction projects which could employ hundreds of people? The tram comes to mind, or the proposed new Columbia River bridge, along with various other proposed construction or infrastructure projects around the greater Portland area. If wages and employment rates are a high priority - and I think they should be - maybe we need to reevaluate projects that offer good construction jobs instead of looking for reasons to oppose so many of them.
Sep 5, '06
did the report consider under-the-table employment? if not, it has limited value because there are a significant amount of decent-paying jobs (i.e. construction) that are off the books. some small business owners also don't report income (or fudge their expenses so that they appear to make significantly less than they do).
Sep 6, '06
rttrt rttrt
Sep 6, '06
http://www.rttrt.com
Sep 6, '06
rttrt
Sep 6, '06
BlueNote wrote:
" If wages and employment rates are a high priority - and I think they should be - maybe we need to reevaluate projects that offer good construction jobs instead of looking for reasons to oppose so many of them."
That's some wrong-headed thinking, BlueNote. That construction jobs pay well is NOT a reason to support bad construction projects. We need good projects to support and we need pressure to make other jobs well-paying. Wasting public money is never a good idea, even if some of it goes to pay workers well.