Number crunchers tracking the state's unemployment cautioned that the news could be grim after an annual revision of years worth of data.
Boy, were they right.
Turns out the recession gripping Florida has been even deeper than reported, with monthly estimates overlooking thousands of lost jobs in construction and retail. The upshot: Economists now think the state will lag the rest of the country in recovery, shoving back expectations of a Florida turnaround into 2010.
TAVARES — Picture a population about the size of Tavares — unemployed.
Lake County's jobless count swelled to 13,055 during January, according to preliminary unemployment figures Workforce Central Florida released Friday. That's about the size of the county seat and the highest raw number of unemployed workers in Lake since at least 1990.
Last month I wrote that Florida was heading into a Depression Lite. Now one of the state's leading economists is saying the same thing.
I lifted this off a St. Pete Times blog.
University of Florida economics professor David Denslow began his presentation to a collection of policy committees in the Florida House today with a word of encouragement. "Florida is going to be just fine,'' he said. Then he hit them with the trend lines, the numbers and the bottom line:
Floridians' consumer confidence fell in February, as hopes dimmed that the nation would find a quick fix for the troubled economy. Nationwide, consumer confidence is now at an all-time low.
The University of Florida says its index of Florida's consumer confidence fell three points to 63. Survey Research Center Director Chris McCarty of the Bureau of Economic and Business Research said the indicator fell because "the novelty of a new administration met with the sustained reality of a faltering economy."
The population in Cape Coral, after plummeting last year, is inching forward. But don’t expect the same breakneck growth as in years past.
With home prices at record lows, retirees and families are snapping up homes and adding to Cape’s population, which ranks as the ninth biggest in the state.
The days of 10 percent annual population growth in the city may be over and 10 percent of the community is out of work, but optimists point to an improving real estate market.
So where's everybody going? Why are schools losing kids and people abandoning Florida neighborhoods?
Does it have anything to do with a story last week that says some 10,000 Burmese pythons are now on the loose in the Everglades and are starting to spread out?
University of Florida economics professor David Denslow began his presentation to a collection of policy committees in the Florida House today with a word of encouragement. "Florida is going to be just fine,'' he said. Then he hit them with the trend lines, the numbers and the bottom line:
“I think this is going to be really, really bad,'' Denslow said. "We’re not talking about the Great Depression. We’re talking about something reasonably close to it. ... We’ve got to be ready for it.”
The Florida Price Level Index (FPLI), established by the Legislature as the basis for the District Cost Differential (DCD) in the Florida Education Finance Program, is used to represent the costs of hiring equally qualified personnel across school districts.
NEW YORK (AP) - Americans' mood about the economy darkened further this month, sending a widely watched barometer of consumer sentiment to an all-time low as people worry about their jobs and watch their retirement funds dwindle, a private research group said Tuesday.
Several big companies Monday announced massive layoffs, sending tens of thousands more to the unemployment lines. The nation's unemployment rate, now at a 16-year high of 7.2 percent, could hit 10 percent or higher later this year or early next year, according to some analysts' projections.
