An attempt to measure the onset of the recession in the Dayton metro area, using Bureau of Labor Statistics monthly employment statistics, since they are very recent (last numbers are from Februrary) and they are shredded out by economic sector. 

 

The statistics used here are all private employment stats, not including the various levels of government, since the intention is to measure economic activity as reflected in job creation and loss across the metro area.

 

First, the big picture.  Metro area performance for the past 10 years using the average number of jobs per year.

 

 

As one can see the metro area was pretty weak in generating employment, even in good times.  One can say the Dayton area never really recovered from the 9-11 Recession”. 

 

Opening up the numbers to look the monthly employment starting in 2006 to see what the trend looked like as we entered the recession. 

 

 

Since these are raw numbers, not seasonally adjusted, one can see the pulse of the local economy over the course of a year, with seasonal employment and downtimes providing a pattern of job growth and decline.  Yet the pattern is more or less the same from year to year, as one sees in 2006 and 2007. 

 

However, in 2008 the pattern collapses, showing the economic pulse becoming irregular.

 

The yearly employment cycle compared, 2008 vs. 2007, showing how the local economy moved into recession by deviations by month and quarter. 

 

 

This BLS time series has sub-shreds by sector.  Taking two gross sectors, good-producing (for Dayton this is mostly construction & manufacturing) and private sector services-producing  (not including government) to see how the trends went for the near term, 2006-early 2009

 

First, goods producing.  2006 is annotated to show features of the annual employment cycle that appear to occur in every year, then 2008 is annotated to show when this sector slid into recession.

 

 

Next, service producing, with similar annotations (this sector has a pretty consistent annual employment cycle in good times).

 

 

It looks like the recession came to Dayton in the first few months of 2008, but for sure for services after April, and for goods, employment rapidly collapsed after the summer.

 

Taking the longer view for these sectors, starting in 1999 (the time series goes back to 1990), labeled with a few observations from yours truly.

 

 

 

The 2000’s were not good times for the Dayton metro area, at least for private sector employment.  So the recession is going to make an already weak situation worse

 

Why the hell are you on UO??

 

You should be teaching Economics, Statistics, History or Urban-omics somewhere!

 

Don't waste your skills on us!  ;)

^Agreed. Mayor McLin should take a look at this. We need a wake up call.

What will those numbers look like if the auto industry shrinks by 20% ?  Dayton still has a lot of auto-related jobs, even though the GM Morain assembly plant has shut down.  If that industry continues to shed jobs, your 2009 job counts will drop rapidly.

 

And do these counts include the Miamisburg/Springboro area?  Do you think jobs are moving just south of the county border into Springboro (Warren county)?  And when the Cox Road interchange on I-75 opens up (along to county border), will more jobs shift out of Montgomery county to just across the border into northern Warren County?

 

I guess I'm wondering if your metro area stops at the border with Warren county, or does it pick up the jobs just over the border that seem to be growing?

The metro area is as defined by OMB:  Greene, Montogomery, Miami, Preble and Darke counties.  Employment is concentrated, of course, in Montgomery & Greene, with actually a lot in Miami, too.

 

Warren is counted with Cincinnati, so the Springboro/Franklin growth would count as part of Cincy.  Austin Road, which is mostly in Montgmery County, would be still count as part of the Dayton metro area.  I guess I could add these Dayton metro numbers in with Cincys to get a big mega-region employment picture.  Or maybe a Cicny poster could do that.

 

What will those numbers look like if the auto industry shrinks by 20% ?  Dayton still has a lot of auto-related jobs, even though the GM Morain assembly plant has shut down.  If that industry continues to shed jobs, your 2009 job counts will drop rapidly.

 

Interestingly enough the BLS stats shred out this specfic subsector for metro Dayton, the NAICS code for "transportation equipment", which, for this metro, is another way of saying autos and autoparts (if this was Seattle/Tacoma it would mean "aerospace").  I am bored with manufacturing and was looking more at construction since I was going to include building permits for houses for Greene County (which is at a census site), and "housing" is a big part of the economic problems....but might look at autos just for the hell of it.

 

 

I hae to keep harping on this point...

 

... but do you feel that the metro area is as defined by OMB includes all Dayton activity? 

 

Look at Warren county, sandwiched between Dayton and Cincinnati.  The lower 2/3 is Cincinnati-oriented.  The northern 1/3 is Dayton oriented.  Yet the whole county gets counted as metro Cincinnati.

 

To say the city of Springboro, or clearcreak township for that matter, is a suburb of Cincinnati is proposterous.  Clearly Springboro is an outgrowth of the southern Montgomery county.  The near-by Dayton Mall area is the fasted growing section of Dayton, and appears to have spilled over into the Springboro area.  That spill-over is counted as Cincinnati growth, not Dayton growth.

 

The new Austin Road interchange will be in Montgomery.  But it will be very close to the county border, so it can be anticipated that a significant amount of growth generated from that new interchange will end up in Springboro (Cincy metro). 

 

From your experience, do you thing an appreciable amount of metro Dayton's growth is actually falling outside the defined metro area, and therefore short-changing Dayton's statistics?

.

.. but do you feel that the metro area is as defined by OMB includes all Dayton activity?

 

 

I think for employment it includes most of it. 

 

There is a way to indirectly calculate this, but the data stops in 2006.  Take the zips of Franklin, Springboro, and Waynesville and add up the number of employees.  The census (not BLS) says 16,312 for that year as a total of those zips.  Then add it to the metro area population (by using the same data source) but adding up county employment for Preble, Darke, Miami, Greene, and Montgomery, + the three Warren County zips I mentioned.

 

The result is that these Warren County areas amount to 4.15% of the metro employment.  In contrast Greene + Montgomery Counties (and they should be taken togther) account for around 80%. 

 

Yet, the issue is that things are not so evenly split in Warren by saying one part of the county is one metro and another another. 

^Also, won't Cincy's and Dayton's metros combine in 2010? If they do, this point will be irrelevant. We are interconnected enough now that there really is not any definable boundary between Cincinnati sprawl and Dayton sprawl.