Sunday, August 25, 2013

"Signs of Recovery."

I won't argue with the Bulletin headline.  After all, it's been 5 - 6 years since we started going down the rabbit hole and you have to start up sometime. 

It's interesting what remains static -- the solid waste statistic.  How to read that?  That actual garbage producing activity is not happening?

That would go with the other graph I've always thought was most important for jobs -- the building permits, which are slowly -- ever so slowly --- going up.

The airport and lodging numbers once again point out the importance of tourism for Central Oregon -- I think that's what saved us from the worse.  Those statistics never went down as much and have trended upward.

So the graph that doesn't seem to fit with the rest of the charts is the housing units sold.  Again, houses selling without being reflected in the job statistics just says to me that the overflow is slowly being sold off to retiree's.  That's my guess.

Which then all loops back to my contention that the economy of Bend is based fundamentally on tourism and retirement.

Which finally brings back the jobs, which while increasing are probably mostly service jobs.

Fair enough?

No comments: