AUSTIN – Today, the Texas Workforce Commission released Texas labor market data for January 2016. The Texas Public Policy Foundation’s Economist Dr. Vance Ginn issued the following statement:
“Texas’ diversified economy continues to create jobs in multiple industries with 31,400 net nonfarm job increase in January; another positive number for all but two of the last 64 months,” said Dr. Ginn. “This brings the total for the last twelve months of data to 187,400 net job gains, contributing to keep the state’s 4.5 percent unemployment rate at or below the U.S. average for 109 straight months. Although the mining and manufacturing sectors have lost a combined 97,900 jobs during those twelve months, which is driven by low oil prices and slow global economic growth, the manufacturing sector added 4,300 jobs in January.
“There are certainly major headwinds facing the Texas economy, but the mining sector directly employs only 2.5 percent of the private labor force and combined with manufacturing is 11 percent. The positive job gains have been primarily in the private service sector with 236,500 jobs added during the last twelve months across multiple industries that range from high wage to low wage jobs for all Texans. While hurdles remain, the Texas model is a time tested combination of limited government and individual responsibility that helps weather the jumps no matter the distance.”
Vance Ginn, Ph.D. is an Economist in the Center for Fiscal Policy at the Texas Public Policy Foundation.
The Texas Public Policy Foundation is a non-profit, free-market research institute based in Austin, Texas.