PA population loss and retention - merged threads

[Craziaskowboi]

For what it's worth, here's how Pennsylvania compared to all states with at least 8,000,000 population in terms of year-over-year job growth from May 2016-May 2017...


+266,600 - Texas
+242,600 - California
+228,000 - Florida
+149,100 - New York
+103,100 - Georgia
+74,400 - Michigan
+69,200 - North Carolina
+54,000 - Pennsylvania
+44,400 - Virginia
+43,100 - New Jersey
+41,100 - Ohio
+34,700 - Illinois


...long-term job growth from May 2000-May 2017...


+2,813,900 - Texas
+2,144,100 - California
+1,542,100 - Florida
+891,600 - New York
+486,800 - Georgia
+476,400 - North Carolina
+438,500 - Virginia
+226,300 - Pennsylvania
+111,700 - New Jersey
-14,400 - Illinois
-121,100 - Ohio
-306,900 - Michigan


..."real" median household income in 2015...


$68,357 - New Jersey
$63,636 - California
$61,486 - Virginia
$60,413 - Illinois
$60,389 - Pennsylvania
$58,005 - New York
$56,473 - Texas
$54,203 - Michigan
$53,301 - Ohio
$50,797 - North Carolina
$50,768 - Georgia
$48,825 - Florida


...and change in "real" median household income from 2000-2015:


+6.3% - Texas
+4.0% - Pennsylvania
+3.4% - New York
-1.2% - California
-1.5% - New Jersey
-3.7% - North Carolina
-4.7% - Illinois
-5.3% - Virginia
-8.7% - Florida
-9.9% - Ohio
-12.0% - Georgia
-13.5% - Michigan


The economy in Pennsylvania has neither boomed nor busted since 2000, relative to other states with at least 8,000,000 population. It's been fair to middling and stable. Long-term job growth hasn't been as fast as Virginia, North Carolina or Georgia, but it hasn't been negative like Ohio, Michigan or Illinois either. And income growth has been good, both absolutely and in "real" terms, especially compared to the negative growth in nine of the other 11 states.

[Coseau]

That is what makes the US so unique. Each state is an individual laboratory on how public policies to a certain extent affect the economies and population growth of these states. Globalization affected the economies of the northern states negatively but also affected North Carolina negatively in the textile industry. Cities that were close to major top universities or were state capitols such as Columbus or the cities of the research triangle in North Carolina were able to weather globalization and offshoring due to the presence of these institutions. Nashville's presence of quality low cost tech learning institutions is a major factor in its growth.

In order to reverse declining or stagnating population numbers Northern state governments have to enact policies that will attract businesses to there states. In Ohio Governor Kasich and the Republican controlled legislature are realizing the stark reality that no Ohio city including Columbus is on the list when major corporations are looking to relocate their headquarters due to the lack of an international airport hub. Now Republican legislatures are proposing passenger rail systems to connect Ohio cities such as to make Cincy, Dayton, and Columbus one mega-region with one airport serving 5.8 million people that would make it attractive to airliners as a location for an international hub.

The funny thing these were the same guys who were so adamantly against passenger rail service between Ohio cities that Governor Kasich turned away 440 million dollars in Federal money to establish a passenger rail system in Ohio in 2010. Now they are realizing in order to compete with other states for major corporation headquarters and the jobs they bring that Ohio cities needs the connectivity of high speed mass transit passenger rail connectivity to increase the economies of scale necessary to get an international airport hub.

If healthy growth to occur in the Northern states such as Pennsylvania, Michigan, Ohio etc it is going to be in the cities by young people just starting out in life. State governments then will have to make long term plans and investments into making their cities into ones that attract and retain out of state residents and businesses alike.

[Duderino]

Originally Posted by Parkranger21

All you have to do is look at the US department of Labor website. There is a record of 6 million open jobs in the US. The country is divided into 4 regions. Northeast, South, Midwest and West.

1. The south has 2.05 million jobs open (Maryland, West Virginia and Delaware down to Florida and Texas)
2. The Midwest has 1.4 million jobs open (Ohio and West)
3. The west has 1.3 million open jobs ( Colorado to west coast)
4. The northeast has 1.05 million open jobs ( Pennsylvania and north to Maine)

You gotta go to where the jobs are. PA is in the worst region to find work.

That's not a valid comparison unless you consider population differences and population growth rates, which gives you an idea about competition levels for jobs. For example, the South is by far the most populous region of the US, with over twice as many people as the Northeast (122 million vs. 56 million). In fact, if you look at job openings per capita, it looks like the Northeast is actually doing just fine.

Despite being long-settled and densely populated, the Northeast region of the US has been the least populous region for quite some time now:

https://www.census.gov/popclock/data...mponent=growth