The longest economic expansion in history crashed into recession this spring because of the COVID-19 pandemic. Unemployment skyrocketed to Depression-era levels before recovering…some. Industries such as airlines, hotels, tourism, restaurants, and brick-and-mortar retailers were savaged.
I've written about this extensively in my Seattle Times columns. But let's narrow the lens to Arizona and Phoenix with help from the invaluable data collected by the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis (FRED). Click on the chart for a larger view.
Unemployment:
Population growth (by numbers and year-over-year percentage change:
Sectors in metro Phoenix:
Miscellany:
• The Economic Innovation Group's Distressed Communities Index this year showed 16.5% of Arizonans lived in a distressed community vs. 28% in a prosperous one. This was in the middle of the pack among states but below Western peers. The score was about the same in Maricopa County but the most prosperous of the state's counties.
• Anecdotal evidence talks about an exodus from California benefiting Arizona. We'll see. Demographers say most residents of the Golden State coming here are less educated, less skilled, and have children. Meanwhile, Phoenix wasn't in the running for Austin's recent big wins, notably Oracle.
• The state's lax attitude toward masks, social distancing, and business restrictions have kept it near the top of COVID cases. (But, but, boosters will sputter, what about California, which supposedly did all those liberal things?).
Parting thoughts:
The year ends with bad news for the critical industry of tourism. Unemployment remains elevated. But people keep coming — the metric by which the local-yokel boosters measure all things good and holy (with championship golf).
Phoenix remains a back-office town, punching far below its weight, despite the relocation of "headquarters" hailed by boosters (tiny suitcase headquarters). Plus retirees, their care-givers, tourism, and the low end of tech (data centers, warehouses, pipedreams — e.g. "Bill Gates is going to build the city of the future in Arizona.").
So, economically, a holding pattern with a body count. By many measures the situation is better than the Great Recession, when Phoenix was an epicenter of the crash.
Important things to elevate the economy in the recovery, such as improved education spending, have not been done. Republicans are fighting a referendum that would better fund schools. Surprise.
Jon, I read your columns in the Seattle Times. I wish we had someone in the AZ Republic who wrote these type of columns. Anyway, I always ask myself this: If the state you live in were a separate nation, how would it do? I think the state of Washington would do fine. Arizona, not so much. We would be a second world country with a significantly lower standard of living. A country with limited intellectual capital and dependent on tourism and retirees from other countries. Maybe a standard of living above Mexico, but not by much. Arizona is hugely dependent on money from the Federal government in the form of Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid dollars and federal defense spending. Our highly educated people are mostly people who were educated outside Arizona (myself included, Lafayette College and University of Chicago, with public school in Maryland). We continue to depend on growth, with people moving here to build housing and retail for people who move here. We have very little homegrown substantive businesses and talent. It basically hasn’t changed in the more than 35 years I have lived in Phoenix, and I don’t think it will ever change. C’est la vie.
We had a person who wrote like that at the AZ Republic, his name was…………….wait for it…………………..wait for it……………., JON TALTON.
“I wish we had someone in the AZ Republic who wrote these type of columns…”
LOL it would never work out.
Not Arizona, but I suspect for reasons similar to Jon’s departure from the Arizona Republic:
Lyz Lenz was a relatively new columnist at the Cedar Rapids Gazette [IA]. Her columns were a breath of fresh air. However, she wrote one too many columns that ruffled MAGA feathers, in particular the column that called out Iowa Senator Charles Grassley’s hypocracy: https://www.thegazette.com/subject/opinion/staff-columnist/grassleys-lying-again-20200922. She was fired soon after. We still have Senator Charles “Pidgen Poop”[sic] Grassley.
Yea, I know Jon use to write for us. I’ve been here since 83. Missing those days of intelligent analysis.
Rich, back then I was naive enough to believe that the “leaders” at the city and county level would listen to Jon because he made such good sense. Boy, what was I thinking. Sorry I misconstrued your tongue in cheek comment.
About my Republic tenure:
https://roguecolumnist.com/2018/01/regrets-i-have-a-few/
Ruben, no problem. Nobody seems to get my humor. It’s really dry. Anyway, I’m glad 2020 is now over. My mother was in hospice at her home in Maryland for 3 months from January through March. I was there the entire time. Then just after she passed, Covid hit big time and I couldn’t leave Maryland to return to AZ for 6 more months. Then I was in the hospital In Phoenix for 4 days in November–not Covid–but it was a nightmare because of Covid. The hospitals and staff really are overwhelmed. You really want to be very careful with wearing your mask and social distancing because you do not want to be in a hospital that is overwhelmed and short of staff in the middle of a pandemic.
Hopefully 2021 will be a good one.
Besides the greedy land developers continuing destruction of the Great Sonoran Desert.
Some events leading up to Arizona and the southwest today.
God and the Queens Priest soldiers
https://organpipehistory.com/history-and-people/first-encounters-spaniards-and-native-americans-1540-1848/#:~:text=In%201613%2C%20the%20Spaniards%20and%20the%20Yaqui%20Indians,Hopi%20tribe%20of%20northeastern%20Arizona%20in%201629.%20T
T.R.’s mistake
https://www.bing.com/search?q=Bullding%20of%20roosevelt%20dam&qs=n&form=QBRE&sp=-1&pq=bullding%20of%20roosevelt%20dam&sc=0-25&sk=&cvid=AD64FA35DEF641FDB81B3790D60879CF
John Birch and the LDS
https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2012/10/28/1151495/-How-Mormon-Leaders-Built-the-John-Birch-Society
More Birch and LDS
https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2017/07/16/the-john-birch-society-is-alive-and-well-in-the-lone-star-state-215377#:~:text=The%20John%20Birch%20Society%20Is%20Back%20Bircher%20ideas%2C,is%20ready%20to%20make%20the%20most%20of%20it.
Happy New Year? HA!
Stand BY
Grand Moff Tarkin
Good piece Jon,
https://www.seattletimes.com/pacific-nw-magazine/so-we-finally-made-it-through-2020-um-now-what/?utm_source=marketingcloud&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Sunday+Morning+1-3-21_1_3_2021&utm_term
Cal,
You should check out how many LDS members there are in the Arizona Legislature and positions in AZ state government.
Ram Jet
I have been since 62.
And
I count the radical Leo Catholics.
The Southern Poverty Law Center counts the rest.
Ram Jet
Ck out the Washington Post Column by David Byler. On the Millions of new Trump voters.
Substantive new comment on the “Color Arizona” column.
Thanks Jon.
My friends I am so saddened to watch the events ocurring in DC.
We are witnessing the darkest day in American History since April 12, 1861.
I hope that reason and common sense will eventually prevail.
While we’re waiting for reason and common sense to prevail, my advice to the Capitol police would be “shoot to kill.”
Enough is enough. This is treason.
Ramjet, remember the 60’s ?
B. Franklin, I’m guessing in another lifetime you were in charge of the troops at Kent State??
Were we to have had a functional congress in the past thirty years, I would venture to say Trump would have never been elected in the first place and we would not be where we are today.
Appears to be 99% peaceful so far. Treat it as such.
Two corrupt parties are to blame.
What a perfect “both sides” reaction.
To compare what happened today to Kent State is one of the silliest things I’ve ever read.
Well done.
While this is a very liberal website doesn’t mean its not accurate.
Opened the gates. Took selfies?
https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2021/1/6/2006463/-Insurrectionists-intended-to-take-members-of-Congress-hostage-hold-show-trials-as-police-stood-by?detail=emaildkbn
I remember the 60’s very well. There is no comparison between then and now.
I mentioned “common sense” in the previous post. The sad truth is that common sense is not very common anymore.
America will survive as it always has.