Since 2012, the Texas economy has been on a strong path, beating US growth rates month after month, but it looks like the Texas economy has started to slow down. Since August of 2015, the Texas economy’s growth rate has dipped below the national growth rate and continued its decline through the end of the year. While the numbers are showing signs of slowing down, the comparison of Texas and the US is also being affected by growth on the national scale. From December 2014 to December 2015, the state added 169,000 nonagricultural jobs with an annual growth rate of 1.4%; the US had a growth rate of 1.9% during the same period. Nongovernment jobs shows a wider gap, with 142,800 jobs added, an annual growth rate of 1.4%, compared to the national 2.2%. During this period, Texas experienced a slight increase in its unemployment rate from 4.6% to 4.7%, which is still below the national average, which decreased from 5.6% to 5%. You can see a full breakdown of the numbers on a state level as well as by metro area in the Texas Real Estate Center at Texas A&M University’s Monthly Review of the Texas Economy (PDF file).
image courtesy of kennymatic
