Behind the Sound Bite
During remarks at the recent Worcester Regional Research Bureau’s annual meeting, Lt. Gov. Timothy Murray said that he’s proud of the economic progress the state has made recently. Specifically, he said Massachusetts has added jobs in each of the past seven months “and we’re the only state in the country that can say that.” In this edition of Behind the Sound Bite, we decided to look into that claim and found that the matter is somewhat up for interpretation.
What are the job numbers for Massachusetts?
According to data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Massachusetts is the only state in the nation that has not lost jobs during the last seven months on a seasonally adjusted basis. If non-seasonally adjusted employment figures are used, then every state in the country, including Massachusetts, has lost jobs since the beginning of the year.
What is seasonal adjustment anyway?
There are annual employment trends during certain times of the year for various reasons. For example, in the summer, college students are out of school, so there can be a spike in the number of people looking for job. During the winter months agriculture-heavy states normally see job losses. The holiday season is a volatile time for the job market. “These variations make it difficult to tell whether month-to-month changes in employment and unemployment are due to normal seasonal patterns or to changing economic conditions,” the BLS website states. To take these measures into account, the BLS created a “seasonally adjusted” employment figure, which aims to smooth out the employment number.
Who are the winners and losers in job gains and losses since the beginning of the year?
Generally speaking, larger states have been much more volatile in job gains and losses. For example, California lost 33,000 jobs in August and another 22,000 in July, on a seasonally adjusted basis. That was after adding 31,000 jobs in March and 25,000 jobs in April. By contrast, two smaller states — Oklahoma and South Dakota — have only lost jobs twice in the last nine months.
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