The State of Working New York the Illusion of Prosperity: New York in the New Economy
Total Page：16
File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb
The State of Working New York The Illusion of Prosperity: New York in the New Economy James Parrott Alice Meaker Zofia Nowakowski September 1999 FISCAL POLICY INSTITUTE 218 W 40th Street 3rd Floor One Lear Jet Lane New York, NY 10018 Latham, NY 12110 T: (212) 730-1551 F: (212) 819-0885 T: (518) 786-3156 F: (518) 786-3146 CHAPTER 5 New York’s Regions in the 1990s his chapter examines the relative perform- tains no MSAs. (Map 5.1) The regions tend to encompass ance of New York’s 10 labor market regions common commuter-sheds, and roughly parallel the T over the 1990s.The most apparent disparity in state’s economic development regions. economic change within New York is the divergence of economic and population growth between upstate and Downstate regions are hit harder during the downstate New York. Bringing the focus down to a recession, but rebound faster than upstate regional level highlights instances of economic change The downstate regional economies — New York that have either been concentrated in just a few City, Hudson Valley, and Long Island — weathered the regions, as in the case of military downsizing, or those greatest declines during a harsh recession, which elimi- that occurred in a more widespread fashion, such as the nated more than 425,000 wage and salary jobs between growth of service industries, restructuring within health 1989 and 1992. (Table 5.1) They then went on to experi- care, and declines in manufacturing and banking. With ence the highest rates of postrecessionary growth. the available county level detail on income, industry Upstate, the Southern Tier had the highest rates of employment, and population and labor force, a picture job loss during the recession. After 1992, most regions of New York’s regional labor markets can be developed experienced growth at rates less than downstate. Cen- that helps to shed light on what is happening to work- tral New York, the North Country, Southern Tier, and ers and living standards across the state. Western New York had particularly low total rates of The New York State Labor Department has defined growth (1 - 3 percent) between 1992 and 1998. each labor market region as a group of counties related Maps of employment and total wage and salary to one or more metropolitan statistical areas (MSAs), changes by county over 1989-98 (Maps 5.2 and 5.3) show with the exception of the North Country, which con- that patterns in wage and salary change largely match MAP 5.1 Clinton New York’s Regions Franklin NORTH Saint Lawrence COUNTRY Jefferson Essex Lewis Hamilton CENTRAL Warren FINGER LAKES Oswego MOHAWK Washington Orleans Oneida Saratoga Monroe Wayne Fulton CAPITAL Onondaga Herkimer Niagara Genesee Ontario Madison Montgomery Schenectady Seneca Cayuga Wyoming Rensselaer WESTERN Livingston Yates Cortland Albany Schohane Erie Otsego Greene Columbia Tompkins Chenango Schuyler Steuben Chautauqua Cattaraugus Allegany Delaware Chemung Tioga Broome SOUTHERN TIER Ulster Dutchess Sullivan HUDSON VALLEY Putnam Orange Westchester Rockland Suffolk Nassau New Bronx York Queens LONG ISLAND SOURCE: NYS DOL. NEW YORK CITY Kings Richmond FPI / The State of Working New York 39 NEW YORK’S REGIONS IN THE 1990S those in employment.They also illus- MAP 5.2 trate regions where these declines Employment Change by County, 1989-98 occurred more consistently across coun- ties. The Southern Tier counties sur- rounding Binghamton, the northern Potsdam Plattsburgh Hudson Valley counties, and southern North Country counties had consistent and deep employment and wage Glens Falls Rochester declines. Central New York and the Syracuse Utica Buffalo Mohawk Valley also experienced consis- Albany tent employment declines across several Jamestown Elmira Binghamton counties. Newburgh The maps also reveal that in some % Change cases regional employment and wage -11% to -6.9% 0% to 6% -6.9% to -3.8% 6% to 12.7% and salary changes were concentrated -3.8% to 0% 12.7% to 27.6% New York within just one or two counties in a SOURCE: NYS DOL, insured employment services. region. For example, in Western New York, the only county to experience overall employ- drop from this group within the next year given its cur- ment decline was Niagara County. In Long Island, Nas- rent rate of growth. sau County declined but Suffolk grew. In the case of regions such as the Finger Lakes, Capital District, and Manufacturing declines across the state, but New York City two counties experienced employment relative wage losses are greater upstate declines, while the rest of the region grew. In many cas- The decline of 276,000 manufacturing jobs over es, counties with faster rates of employment and wage the decade affected all regions in New York. Downstate and salary growth were located in rings outside of met- lost much more of its manufacturing, but upstate is ropolitan centers, following trends in suburbanization much more dependent on manufacturing for employ- of economic development begun years earlier. ment and wages. (Table 5.2) In the upstate economy, By the first half of 1999, most of the metropolitan manufacturing brought in 24 percent of total wages areas of New York State had surpassed their 1989 earned, while downstate, the wage share was just 9 per- employment lev- cent. The manufacturing wage ratio with respect to the els. Exceptions to TABLE 5.1 this rule are the Employment Change, New York and Regions, 1989, 1992, 1998 Dutchess County, Binghamton, and Employment Employment Employment 1989 1992 1998 1989-92 1992-98 1989-98 New York City MSAs, which took New York State 8,131,550 7,618,523 8,093,649 -6.3% 6.2% -0.5% large employ- Hudson Valley 823,619 773,693 810,790 -6.1% 4.8% -1.6% ment losses and Long Island 1,115,322 1,029,168 1,117,202 -7.7% 8.6% 0.2% New York City 3,532,892 3,220,443 3,437,817 -8.8% 6.7% -2.7% Buffalo-Niagara Capital District 456,228 453,119 474,034 -0.7% 4.6% 3.9% Central New York 327,996 321,218 324,533 -2.1% 1.0% -1.1% Falls, which Finger Lakes 527,533 523,211 549,131 -0.8% 5.0% 4.1% exhibited only Mohawk Valley 182,581 178,241 189,234 -2.4% 6.2% 3.6% North Country 142,528 143,114 145,795 0.4% 1.9% 2.3% slight total Southern Tier 297,424 285,252 291,838 -4.1% 2.3% -1.9% growth over the Western New York 626,065 611,206 628,840 -2.4% 2.9% 0.4% decade. New York Note: The State Labor Department classifies 124,431 jobs (1998) as Statewide that are not, or not yet allocated by region. SOURCE: NYS DOL, insured employment series. City will likely 40 The State of Working New York / FPI NEW YORK’S REGIONS IN THE 1990S average wage also tends to be higher MAP 5.3 upstate than downstate, ranging from a Real Wage and Salary Change by County, 1989-98 low of 116 percent in New York City to 150 percent of the wage in the Finger Lakes and 165 percent in Hudson Valley. Potsdam Plattsburgh As a result of the importance of manu- facturing to the upstate economy, the upstate region experienced a relative Glens Falls Rochester Syracuse Utica economic impact of total wage losses in Buffalo Albany manufacturing nearly three times as great as downstate. Jamestown Elmira Binghamton Total manufacturing wage declines % Change Newburgh as a percent of total wages disbursed 2.6% to 3.8% 6.5% to 8.5% 3.8% to 5% 8.5% to 10.7% were large enough to play an important 5% to 6.5% 8.5% to 10.7% New York role in a number of regions. The South- ern Tier lost the largest amount of SOURCE: NYS DOL, insured employment series. wages relative to its total wage base between 1990 and 1998 (6.7 percent), with Hudson Val- 37 percent of the increase in personal income despite ley, the Finger Lakes Region, Long Island, and Mohawk the fact that they represent 58 percent of total income. Valley not far behind. There are two quite interesting facts related to this find- ing. The first is that transfer payments contributed Total personal income grows largely due to nearly twice as much as wages to the state’s income downstate and the growth in transfer payments growth. The second is that the downstate increase in In 1997, total personal income in New York State real wages more than accounted for the statewide was $548.9 billion. For the entire state, real personal increase.1 In other words, as Table 5.3 makes clear, total income grew by $41.3 billion, or 8.1 percent, from 1989 real wages fell by $1.1 billion in the upstate area as a to 1997. However, real wages accounted for only about whole from 1989-97.The downstate contribution to wage growth over the decade is partly due to its large TABLE 5.2 The Importance of Manufacturing to New York and the Regions, 1989-98 Manufacturing Share Manufacturing Share Average Manufacturing Wage Change in Real Total Change in of Employment of Total Wages as Percent of Average Wage Manufacturing Wages Manufacturing in All Industries, 1998 in All Industries, 1998 in All Industries, 1998 1989-98 Employment 1989-98 New York State 11.5% 14.3% 124.2% -12.9% -23.4% Capital District 9.6% 13.6% 140.9% -13.5% -19.0% Central New York 15.9% 22.8% 143.4% -10.8% -16.7% Finger Lakes 23.4% 35.1% 149.6% -12.5% -14.7% Hudson Valley 10.8% 17.9% 165.0% -21.7% -35.4% Long Island 10.1% 11.9% 117.5% -28.2% -30.2% Mohawk Valley 17.4% 20.0% 115.1% -19.2% -15.9% New York City 7.9% 9.1% 115.8% -4.8% -28.1% North Country 13.2% 18.2% 137.7% -2.7% -7.6% Southern Tier 21.2% 30.2% 142.8% -18.3% -19.7% Western New York 17.7% 25.8% 145.3% -3.2% -12.6% Downstate 8.6% 10.4% 121.4% -11.8% -29.2% Upstate 16.8% 24.4% 145.2% -14.3% -17.8% Note: ’Total Wages‘ and ’Average Wage in All Industries‘ values exclude securities.