Unemployment rate in Alaska (Anchorage, Juneau and: real estate, 2015, home)

[riceme]

I'm just going to leave this here.

https://www.bls.gov/web/laus/laumstrk.htm

https://www.bls.gov/eag/eag.ak.htm

labor force data

http://labor.alaska.gov/news/2017/news17-25.pdf

Alaska State Unemployment Rate and Total Unemployed | Department of Numbers

[Metlakatla]

Yep Stay away.

Here's a caveat, though....the UE rate on POW has traditionally been in the double digits, yet we've got to import workers from the -48 due to the extremely low quality of the local labor force. I've noticed that lots of pretty good year-round jobs are also filled by people from somewhere else. Not saying that anyone should just up and move to Alaska, but...Alaska currently has the least educated labor force in the country. If you've got anything to offer and you really want to live there, it might be worth a shot -- but don't move without a job. Even if you do move with a job, have an escape plan as in enough money set aside to get back home if things don't work out.

[Metlakatla]

Ouch. Just read that 18,000 state workers were notified that they may be losing their jobs soon. That's gotta hurt in a state as sparsely populated as AK.

[Music_Man]

Originally Posted by Metlakatla

Ouch. Just read that 18,000 state workers were notified that they may be losing their jobs soon. That's gotta hurt in a state as sparsely populated as AK.

That is true! Thanks to the idiots hiding in Juneau and the people who keep voting them in. Their 90 days expired long ago, their pay should have stopped then too.

[Metlakatla]

^ I heard one of those idiots was actually hiding in Hawaii trying to convince people via the internet that she was taking care of business in Juneau.

[riceme]

Originally Posted by Metlakatla

^ I heard one of those idiots was actually hiding in Hawaii trying to convince people via the internet that she was taking care of business in Juneau.

Noooo... who would do such a thing??! Representative Charisse Millett

[Arktikos]

Originally Posted by Music_Man

That is true! Thanks to the idiots hiding in Juneau and the people who keep voting them in. Their 90 days expired long ago, their pay should have stopped then too.

The abundance of nut jobs in our state government refuse to compromise. So, perhaps Gov. Walker and the more rational members should go ahead and sign on to their stupid plan.

Those extremists want lots of heads to roll, and so they will. Then come next election, it will be their turn to get the boot in the arse.

[Music_Man]

Originally Posted by Blind Cleric

Then come next election, it will be their turn to get the boot in the arse.

Sounds good but John Q Public has a very short memory and keeps voting the idiots back in!

[AlaskaErik]

Originally Posted by Blind Cleric

The abundance of nut jobs in our state government refuse to compromise. So, perhaps Gov. Walker and the more rational members should go ahead and sign on to their stupid plan.

Those extremists want lots of heads to roll, and so they will. Then come next election, it will be their turn to get the boot in the arse.

The problem is that everyone thinks their own representative and senator are doing a great job. It's all those other clowns that are the problem.

[riceme]

Originally Posted by riceme

I'm just going to leave this here.

https://www.bls.gov/web/laus/laumstrk.htm

https://www.bls.gov/eag/eag.ak.htm

labor force data

http://labor.alaska.gov/news/2017/news17-25.pdf

Alaska State Unemployment Rate and Total Unemployed | Department of Numbers

I'll add this little nugget of joy to the mix:

The average wage in Alaska fell last year for first time since the mid-1990s

Author: Jeannette Lee Falsey
dated: 11 hours ago
Published 11 hours ago

The elimination of thousands of jobs in oil and gas, work that tends to pay well, drove down the average wage in Alaska last year for the first time in two decades, recently released state data shows.

The wage drop could mean there is less money from consumers circulating in the Alaska economy. That's assuming people aren't drawing on savings, investments or other means aside from paychecks to maintain spending levels.

"It's certainly a metric that matters because the economy depends on people spending to a great extent and wages comprise a very significant portion of total income," said Mouhcine Guettabi, an economist at the Institute of Social and Economic Research at the University of Alaska Anchorage. "People have money coming in from a lot of different sources, but for the vast majority of us, if we put aside subsistence and high net-worth individuals, wages tend to be most significant source of income."



The statewide average wage in 2016 was $4,434 a month, nearly 2 percent lower than the previous year. Adding up the wages of all Alaskans, workers here were paid $17.7 billion last year, down about 3.7 percent from 2015.

Changes to worker pay varied according to industry. Average wages in construction and legal services suffered, but remained steady in real estate support staff and restaurants. The data does not include people who are self-employed, like business owners, real estate agents and contractors, or the uniformed military.

Health care continued to flourish. Wages in hospitals and doctor's and dentist's offices and other outpatient facilities showed noticeable growth. But the wage data doesn't capture many of the high-paying jobs held by doctors who are in profit-sharing business partnerships or work for themselves.

The oil and gas sector, which had 2,800 fewer jobs in 2016 than the previous year, posted a 3.6 percent wage drop of $5,000 a year.

In addition, the share of oil and gas wages in the economy shrank. Oil and gas represented 11 percent of all wages in 2015, according to a report (*link below) by state labor economist Neal Fried. The next year they made up 8.6 percent of the total earned by all Alaskans.

The last time nominal wages fell was the mid-1990s when oil industry jobs were falling and big-box stores like K-Mart were proliferating. The increase in retail positions helped boost jobs and economic growth, but not wages.

"It was a period of wowzer-zowzer retail growth, but a lousy period for average monthly wages," said Fried. "I'd say, 'The economy is growing,' and people would say, 'Well that may be true, but they're all low-paying jobs.' "

State labor economist Dan Robinson published a report in April that found growth to be the default mode for any modern state economy in the United States.

Robinson said the same can be said for wages.

"Wages don't usually go down. You don't need me to say that," Robinson said. "The numbers say that."

https://www.adn.com/business-economy...e-mid-1990s/#_

*link to Neal Fried report: http://labor.alaska.gov/trends/feb17.pdf

For some reason that old Anne Murray song popped into my head as I was posting this, so I dialed it up on the old YouTube and realized that not a whole hell of a lot has changed since 1983. Enjoy:


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XTJcchmKhPw