South By North Strategies, Ltd.

CHAPEL HILL (December 20, 2011) – North Carolina’s job market recorded no meaningful job growth in November. While the number of jobs in the state rose slightly, unemployment remained at a distressingly high level. Over the past year, North Carolina has netted just 19,600 jobs (+0.5 percent), while the number of unemployed individuals has risen by 12,215 (+2.8 percent). These findings come from new data from the Division of Employment Security.

“Job growth remained elusive in November,” said John Quinterno, a principal with South by North Strategies, Ltd., a research firm specializing in economic and social policy. “The total number of jobs in the state has remained essentially flat so far in 2011. Despite the little growth that has occurred, the state still has 291,900 fewer jobs than it did four years ago.”

In November, North Carolina employers added 3,800 more payroll jobs than they cut. Net gains occurred entirely in the private sector (+4,600, +0.1 percent), while the public sector shed 800 jobs (-0.1 percent) with all of the losses occurring within state and local governments. Within the private sector, trade, transportation, and utilities gained the most jobs in absolute terms (+5,400, +0.8 percent) with the bulk of the gains occurring in the retail trade subsector (+3,400, +0.8 percent). Education and health services gained 2,200 jobs (+0.4 percent), followed by other services (+1,200, +0.8 percent). Professional and business services shed the most jobs, on net, (-3,700, -0.7 percent) with two-thirds of the losses occurring in the administrative and waste management subsector (-2,500, -1 percent). Payroll employment in financial activities, meanwhile, fell by -1,000 positions (-0.5 percent).

A positive revision to the October data found that the state gained 1,700 more jobs than first reported (+7,200 versus +5,500). With that data revision, North Carolina has lost, on net, 295,000 positions, or 7.1 percent of its payroll base, since December 2007. Since bottoming out in February 2010, the state has netted an average of 1,300 payroll jobs per month, resulting in a cumulative gain of 28,000 positions (+0.7 percent)

“Compared to December 2007, North Carolina has fewer payroll jobs in every major industry group except for educational and health services and leisure and hospitality services,” noted Quinterno. “Despite experiencing some consistent growth in the private sector in recent months, losses in the public sector have negated much of the modest private-sector gain. Since February 2010, local government employment has fallen by 3.6 percent, and state government employment has contracted by 4.1 percent. Over that span, declines in the public sector have offset 45.1 percent of the gains in the private sector.”

Between November 2010 and November 2011, North Carolina gained, on net, 19,600 jobs (+0.5 percent). Net public-sector losses (-11,200) offset 36.4 percent of the net private-sector gains (+30,800 positions). In terms of individual private industries, trade, transportation, and utilities grew the most in absolute terms (+12,100, +1.7 percent), while construction lost the most jobs (-2,700, -1.6 percent). In the public sector, net losses stemmed from drops in state (-4,600, -2.4 percent) and local (-7,500, -1.7 percent) government employment.

The household data for November also were weak. Last month, the size of the workforce fell slightly (-3,563, -0.1 percent) to 4.50 million. While the total number of employed individuals rose (+12,822, +0.1 percent) and the number of unemployed individuals fell (-16,385 -3.5 percent), unemployment remained at an elevated level of 10 percent. Moreover, slightly more than a fifth of the drop in the number of unemployed persons was due to individuals leaving the labor market altogether.

Between November 2010 and November 2011, the size of the labor force increased by 38,724 individuals (+0.9 percent). Over the year, the unemployment rate rose by 0.2 percentage points, climbing to 10 percent from 9.8 percent. November was the fifth consecutive month with a statewide unemployment rate of at least 10 percent. The monthly statewide unemployment rate has been at least 9.7 or higher in every month since February 2009.

“North Carolina’s labor market has made minimal progress so far in 2011,” observed Quinterno. “The job gap has closed only slightly since January, and the unemployment rate is higher now than it was at the start of the year. Especially alarming is the fact that the share of working-age North Carolinians with a job remains near the lowest level recorded since 1976. In November, only 55.5 percent of working-age North Carolinians had jobs, down from 62.4 percent in December 2007.”

“The November job report shows yet again that the state’s labor market is not mending itself. In fact, by many indicators, conditions have worsened over the course of 2011. With only one month left in the year, 2011 appears on track to becoming North Carolina’s fourth consecutive year of negative or minimal job growth.”