Wednesday, December 3, 2008
Kotz Not a Good Sign: Tennessee Ranks 14th in Economic Distress
Posted by Pete Kotz on Wed, Dec 3, 2008 at 5:19 AM
That, however, seems to be wishful thinking. A new report by the Kaiser Foundation indicates that while we came late to the suffering, we're now staging an impressive rally.
With the stats for October now in, Tennessee has jumped to a 20th ranking in foreclosures, and a handsome Top 10 positioning for unemployment, added to a 6.8 jump in food stamp filing over the last year. While we're still not taking the pummeling found on the coasts, it appears the Gods of Mean Wallets have not forgotten about us.
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"The thinking: Since we didn't have a major housing bubble, and since we aren't overly reliant on manufacturing, we might escape the beating being administered to the rest of the country."
Huh? Tennessee has long been one of the more manufacturing-dependent states in the Union, with proportions of manufacturing employment in 2006 [the latest figures I could find] roughly the same as in Michigan or Ohio. It eternally amazes me that people don't realize just how much southerners have been dependent on factory jobs. Not as much as formerly, to be sure; those jobs have been eroding at a ferocious clip for over a decade. But the notion that we are less dependent on manufacturing than other parts of the nation is wildly at variance with reality.
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