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- North Dakota has been dethroned, knocked from the top as the best job creating state in the latest state level jobs data. Nevada moved to the top with a 3.8 percent job addition rate over the past 12 months versus North Dakota’s 3.7 percent. Despite this change, North Dakota is still the king in terms of longer-term job growth.
- Colorado, Florida, and Oregon round out the top-five fastest job creating states.
- On the bottom, New Mexico and Kentucky encountered very modest net job losses. New Jersey, Virginia, and Alaska had minimal or no job creation.
- Large cities are doing relatively well. That means traffic jams are getting worse in these markets, simply a byproduct of more people driving to work. San Jose in particular is red hot, with a 4.4 percent job growth rate. That is why both rent and home prices are escalating as more people seek housing in areas where there is minimal new home construction.
- Detroit is reversing some of its recent gains in jobs. In the latest data, Detroit shed 4,200 jobs. But the western part of the state is doing well, with Grand Rapids job growth rising by 3.0 percent.
- Irrespective of short-term job market trends, over the long haul job creation will favor large major cities because job growth will be faster in professional services than in manufacturing or agriculture. Jobs like accounting, software development, legal services, management consultants, and medical services will principally be in cities. Moreover, people are drawn to large cities because of cultural amenities that only a large city can justify, such as concerts, museums, and zoos. Companies, knowing that talented workers are drawn to cities, will want to be based in large cities to have access to a large pool of potential job candidates. Traffic unfortunately will get hellish. That is why developers of condominiums near downtowns in traffic congested cities can anticipate turning a good profit.
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