Job losses prove we’re in recession

[Omaha Steve]

http://www.buffalonews.com/145/story/559521.html

01/25/09 07:06 AM
Job losses prove we’re in recession
David Robinson
BUFFALO’S BUSINESS

So much for all the talk about the Buffalo Niagara region being a good place to ride out the recession.

While it took about nine months longer to hit here than it did across the country, thanks to our stable but subdued housing market, the steep decline we’ve weathered since September proves that when the national economy turns sour, there’s no place to hide.

“It took a long time for the recession to arrive in Western New York,” says John Slenker, the state Labor Department’s regional economist in Buffalo.

And arrive it has. The region in December endured its biggest monthly job loss since March 2002, when Western New York still was mired in the last recession. The December job losses were so severe — 7,600 positions vanished from December 2007 to December 2008 — that the region now has fewer jobs than it’s had in any December since 1995.

Even Slenker, whose job it is to put together the monthly employment data for the region, was surprised by the severity of the December decline. “This was a larger downturn than I was expecting,” he says.

But this is an economy that’s being wracked by fear, in addition to the fallout from the housing bubble, the vice-like credit crunch and the overall economic malaise it’s creating.

FULL story at link.

[whistle]

1. No need to wait any longer for more data, it is a depression

[elocs]

2. When people are suffering, what is the point of quibbling whether it's a recession or depression?

If it's a depression, will manna suddenly start raining from heaven that wouldn't happen if it was a recession? No matter what it is called, the people of this country desperately need help in finding jobs, keeping jobs, keeping homes.

[FreakinDJ]

3. and Price Reductions prove it is a Depression