Old AmrapinVA

No argument there. Manufacturing is still cratering and is still 12% of the job market. How far can Greater Cleveland shrink before there is a balance? There's no reason to think things will change this year so far.

www.bls.gov Go to: Areas at a Glance.

More weak NE Ohio data: In Feb. the Cleveland market saw a 0.8% y-o-y growth in the job market compared to a state average of 1.5%. Cincinnati grew by 2.2%, Columbus 2%. Still doing better than Pittsburgh which only grew by 0.1%. Labor market shrunk for the first two months of the year as well.

That's right. But the national average was around 6% and Portland saw a jump of 11.2%. Chicago was the worst market at 2.1%. So in the basket of the 30 markets studied, Cleveland was near the bottom but did see a decent rise. Cleveland was one of only 3 markets to see rent declines. The market is still pretty weak but it's not surprising because people are moving away from the area.

Problem is that the bad outweighs the good unlike most other US markets.

Both rents and home prices are well below the national average and growing at slower pace as well. I guess not it's not to surprising looking at the recent populations statistics.

Right. It's not denialism to lift the hood and study all the shifts and trends underneath the high level metrics. As SixthCity said above, these top level metrics are the result of tons of different things. They are the result of the decisions of literally millions of households responding to dozens of distinct factors. Along the same lines, the metro area didn't really "lose" 3,000 people between 2014 and 2015. It probably lost something like 80,000 people. But over the same one year period, it gained 40,000 of new babies, 30,000 of new in-movers from other metro areas, and 7,000 in-movers from other countries [i'm making those numbers up to illustrate.] I'm not saying you are a denialist but I also know I'm not doing a straw man. Cleveland has been on the economic bottom for far too long. There's no harm in examining that and figuring out how to improve on it. It's not Cleveland bashing.

No doubt there is a demographic issue but Columbus creates jobs at a much faster clip than Cleveland. People move to jobs. If Greater Cleveland businesses offered more employment options people would move to the area. Cleveland is one of the few metros left that hasn't fully recovered from the Great Recession. The lack of jobs shows up in labor market and population statistics and Cleveland remains at the bottom.

Greater Cleveland is doing awesome, I forgot. Carry on. Straw man alert! You win, I lose. Meanwhile Greater Cleveland bleeds jobs and people. No straw man there. How is the region bleeding jobs? Employment in Northeast Ohio took a slight dip in January, with a loss of 650 jobs from December to January. That represents a loss of 0.06% of the regions jobs, according to the Ahola Crains Employment (ACE) Report, with the number employed dropping to 1.16 million. That January number, however, is a gain of 1,244 jobs, or 0.11%, from the number of people employed in the region in January 2015. http://www.kleinhenzassociates.com/uncategorized/ace-report-region-loses-650-jobs-in-january-but-year-over-year-employment-is-up-slightly/ Cleveland is not bleeding jobs. I meant workers. My bad.

I agree with what you are saying but there were more jobs and people in Greater Cleveland 10 years ago. Not quite sure what's possible now that wasn't possible then. How many people and jobs have to leave to have a real transformation?

Greater Cleveland is doing awesome, I forgot. Carry on. Straw man alert! You win, I lose. Meanwhile Greater Cleveland bleeds jobs and people. No straw man there.

Greater Cleveland is doing awesome, I forgot. Carry on.

Columbus and Cincinnati are expanding. I'd settle for that as a start for Cleveland.

So when does this happen? It's been 50 years! Other manufacturing cities have completely transformed in that time. Others are transitioning and growing. Is it wrong to look at more successful examples of growth? There are many. Which other manufacturing cities? Pittsburgh, Detroit, Buffalo and Cleveland are all in the same boat. Manufacturing was not just in those four cities. Baltimore, Milwaukee, St. Louis, Boston, Chicago, Cincinnati, North Jersey, Philadelphia, Birmingham, Manchester. Hell, Toronto.

I see this line of criticism a lot. But as I posed to you above...what does that mean in concrete action? Should the people of Cleveland all pledge an oath of struggle? Never say anything is good because the statistics are bad in the aggregate? Burn themselves on Public Square? You dodged my question above but I actually want to know what you think would be adequate action for politicians and the people of Cleveland to show that they "accept that Cleveland may be struggling on a greater scale than (they) want to admit." This is silly. I'm dodging nothing, just expressing frustration at a place that fades away and the lack of vision to actually fix the problem. Certainly there are many, many things to be proud of about Cleveland but there is also a need to see what others are doing in other places to make Cleveland better. It such a great place and has so much potential but it's never going to realize it until joins the growth of the rest of the country. it is what it is.

So when does this happen? It's been 50 years! Other manufacturing cities have completely transformed in that time. Others are transitioning and growing. Is it wrong to look at more successful examples of growth? There are many.

It's not just this study. Others are coming out of CSU about how the area is transforming itself. Yet with all that "transformation" Cleveland is still at the bottom of the American economic ladder and last year Cleveland accelerated downward while the rest of the nation went the other way. But this is broader than CSU. It's a community thing. It's hard to accept that Cleveland may be struggling on a greater scale than people want to admit.

Yes. It shows as Greater Cleveland continues to fade away.

No. I'm talking about CSU releasing a study without double checking the figures with the folks at the BLS. Everyone is then misinformed and it allows politicians and leaders to hide behind these studies as a fact that everything is OK.

Ok but what does that mean in concrete terms? Should we have the mayors of greater Cleveland stand on Public Square and read a statement that Cleveland is a place of last resort? Issue a series of press releases that state that Cleveland remains in the economic doldrums? Wear dunce caps? (that may actually be somewhat satisfying) Or we can hide behind CSU studies using incorrect labor data to pretend Cleveland is doing better than Minneapolis. Being honest, some are already wearing the dunce caps. I don't get why having an realistic discussion about the local economy would be so hard.

Yeah, I don't remember when Cleveland had 750,000 but I do remember when it had 575,000. I lived near W 117th and Lorain in the 1980s. Used to eat at the diner on the corner all the time. I used to have a friend who lived off of St. Clair and 55th. There's nothing left there now. There has to be a better way.

A few points: You're wrong about the local economy. For about a half-century now Greater Cleveland's economy has not been stagnant, it's been contracting. It's contracting while almost every metro in the US, large and small, expands. Which means almost every metro area, large and small, in the US has been more attractive for employers and job seekers compared to Cleveland for about 50 years now. Yet working on solution to getting out of the economic basement is out of everyone's control? I just don't believe that. I'm not demanding legislation, just a realization by leaders that Greater Cleveland continues to be a choice of last resort for a vast majority of Americans who have choice between two places to work and live. And, maybe, just maybe, there are ways things can be done better. That there is probably an example or two that can be emulated from somewhere else.

Yeah but if businesses were creating jobs at better clip, the labor force wouldn't contract. It's not a complex issue on that front. Why aren't business creating more jobs in Greater Cleveland? That's the question. Not sure. But I suspect the answer may be related to the question my girlfriend asks me every night - "Why don't you make more money?" Let me know when you figure it out so I can let her know. So because it is difficult to answer we let Greater Cleveland fade away? Why don't we ask local political and industry leaders, on a consistent basis, why they aren't making the area more attractive to employers? I don't get it and, as you can tell, it frustrates the hell out of me.

Yes, and to go one step further (obviously not in response to you), "attract more jobs" isn't a policy, it's a goal. No one knows how to make it happen. Even our current gubernatorial administration, which has made this goal #1, can't pull the state from near the bottom of the pile. Yet Columbus and Cincinnati are expanding. There are successful cities all over the country that Greater Cleveland can use as an example. So I don't buy "no one knows how it happens". It happens on a such a large scale in the US that most places are successful in attracting new jobs and expanding labor markets. Greater Cleveland is a consistent outlier in this. Why?

Yeah but if businesses were creating jobs at better clip, the labor force wouldn't contract. It's not a complex issue on that front. Why aren't business creating more jobs in Greater Cleveland? That's the question.