What credit, if any, should Rick Perry get for Texas’ relatively good economic condition? This Statesman story aims to find out.
As Gov. Rick Perry’s flirtation with running for president puts the Texas economy under a microscope, there’s no question jobs would be Perry’s calling card in a national campaign focused on the economy. The state’s longest-serving governor can say people are voting with their feet. But what do people like Fishbein find once they are here? And how much credit can Perry take for the state’s economy?
Most people know of Texas’ reputation for creating jobs — the cornerstone of Perry’s pitch that limited government, less regulation and low taxes are the tonic for what ails the nation. Yet almost half of the state’s job growth the past two years was led by education, health care and government, the sectors of the economy that will now take a hit as federal stimulus money runs out and the Legislature’s 8 percent cut in state spending translates into thousands of layoffs among state workers and teachers in the coming weeks.
Also, Texas is tied with Mississippi as the nation’s leaders in minimum wage jobs. And conservatives argue that Texas can do more to lower its tax burden on businesses, which is higher than the national average and states such as California and Massachusetts that have a personal income tax.
That said, experts agree that Texas, with its 10 million-plus workforce, is adding more jobs than other states. They don’t always agree on the fairest way to report Texas’ proportion of the nation’s job growth since the recession ended officially in June 2009. The number ranges from a third to nearly half, a significant portion to be sure. And in raw numbers, Texas has no peer as it leads the nation through a slow recovery.
The state’s economy added about 282,300 jobs from June 2009 through April, according to an analyis by the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas. The state also lost 45,500 jobs during that period.
Job gains and losses, however, did not fall equally across the Texas economy the past two years. Construction, manufacturing and information sectors lost jobs overall. Education and health services led in job creation (32 percent of all jobs added), followed by professional and business services (23 percent), petroleum (18 percent) and government (12 percent). Other industry sectors, ranging from utilities to hospitality, had smaller job gains.
Pia Orrenius, a Dallas Fed economist, explained Texas’ resiliency this way:
“The state has some natural advantages, including energy, Gulf ports and proximity to Mexico, and a young and rapidly growing population,” she said. “But the state also has business-friendly policies. The state attracts businesses due to its low cost of doing business and attracts people due to its relatively low tax burden and low cost of living.”
Which, as the story notes, is how it was before Perry took office, and how it will undoubtedly continue to be after he leaves. You want to give Perry credit for that, fine, but then he also deserves the “credit” for all of the austerity-induced job losses and all future educational setbacks resulting from cuts to public schools. That story is yet to be written, but the parts of it that begin to show up in the next few months while Perry may or may not be mounting a Presidential campaign deserve a full airing.
In 1998, when Rick Perry became lite gov, the price of oil was around $13 a barrel. In December 2000, when he became gov, is was $24. Now it is $111 a barrel. In the months after the market crash in 2008, it dropped briefly down to $34, but generally speaking, over the course of Perry’s governorship, the price of oil has gone up and mostly stayed up. It has never gotten anywhere near as low as it was when he commenced governing.
Furthermore, new technological advances have allowed energy companies to start exploiting shale formations that contain natural gas. The first major formation to be drilled was the Barnett Shale near Fort Worth, and since then it has expanded to other parts of the country, including other parts of Texas (such as the Eagle Ford Shale).
The result of this has been a huge expansion of both E&P companies and oil field service companies. Texas has been the beneficiary of this expansion. Plays like the Barnett and the Eagle Ford have also pumped billions of dollars of royalty money into the Texas economy.
I know Texas has a “diverse” economy, but oil and gas are still a really big part of it. Perry has zero control over the price of oil, zero control over the geology of Texas, and very very little influence over the technological innovations of oil and gas drillers. That should be remembered when one talks about how much credit Perry deserves for our relatively good economy. (That said, every laid off teacher and nursing home worker knows who to blame for their joblessness.)
as a conservative leaning independant I can say president Perry doesn’t fill me with excitement. There are a lot of people I know that are, or lean republican that aren’t thrilled with the prospect.
I would, and have, argue that Perry, like Palin and Bachmann, is unelectable at the national level. The dems dream ticket is some combination of those three. Of course, on “conservative” blogs, comments like this get me a firestorm of criticism.
Ross the funny thing is, and this is purely anecdotal, people around the country seem to like Perry better than we do. Go figure.
I’ve turned a few people against Perry by pointing out his love for making his supporters wealthy on the backs of Texas property owners (Trans Texas Corridor). And his love for poorly designed taxes. it’s even more fun when someone says “He’s a good Christian man”. Ha. Liek that matters as much as his actions.
Most Non Texans know little about Rick Perry, beyond him being the Governor of Texas. We’ll see what the public thinks of him after some televised debates. I have rarely seen Perry speak but when I have, I have not been impressed. Flashbacks to Bush will not help Perry.
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