Seattle's Lost Decade
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Since WASHINGTON 1932 RESEARCH COUNCIL Policy Brief PB 09-01 August 10, 2009 SEATTLE’S LOST DECADE: THE CITY HAD FEWER PRIVATE BRIEFLY Seattle’s business taxes are signifi- JOBS IN 2008 THAN IN 2000 cantly higher than those in nearby suburban jurisdictions, Employment in Seattle never fully recovered from the dot-com bust. In and these suburban jurisdictions March 2008, at the peak of the last expansion, the city had 7,900 fewer pri- have been adding jobs while em- vate sector jobs than it had in March 2000. Nearby cities did considerably ployment in Seattle has stag- better over the same period: Bellevue added 19,200 private jobs; Redmond nated. added 16,000; Issaquah, 4,000; and Bothell, 3,400. Taxes matter when businesses de- Even as Seattle’s employment stagnated, the population of the city has con- cide where to locate. This is par- tinued to grow. New residents are drawn to the city by its attractiveness as a ticularly true for decisions about place to live. Many of these new residents, however, commute to suburban where to locate within a metro jobs. It is important not to let Seattle’s residential renaissance deflect atten- area, where the competing loca- tion from the challenges it faces as a working city. tions all have access to the same Location is a choice, and increasingly businesses are choosing suburban lo- pool of labor. cations over Seattle. This presents a long-run fiscal challenge for Seattle city government, which gets 54 percent of its general tax revenue from taxes paid This Brief updates our December by businesses. As population expands, the demand for public services ex- 2007 Brief: Seattle’s Business Taxes pands proportionally. If employment is not also expanding, city revenues Are a Competitiveness Issue. will lag behind. The temptation is always to make up the shortfall by boosting taxes on busi- ness, but this is counterproductive. The research is clear: taxes matter to businesses when they choose where to locate within a metropolitan area. Se- attle’s business taxes are already significantly higher than those in the subur- ban jurisdictions. In 2007, the city collected $485 in business taxes and fees per private sector employee, which was nearly twice the amount collected in Bellevue and more than five times the amount in Redmond. The tax gap is even larger today because of the $25 per head annual tax that the city began collecting from businesses in 2008. To reverse the trend in jobs, Seattle must become more competitive within the region. If this does not happen, the alternatives are either fewer public services or higher taxes on residents. WHILE SEATTLE HAS ADDED 39,000 RESIDENTS SINCE 2000 The 1910 census counted more than 247,000 residents in Seattle; fully five out of six people living in King County were Seattle citizens. From 1910 to 1960, the city added 320,000 residents (some of this growth came through annexation). King County population outside the city limits grew even more rapidly, however. The growth outside of the city was encouraged by the in- creasing ownership of automobiles and the construction of roadways WASHINGTON RESEARCH COUNCIL (notably the first Lake Washington floating bridge) that made it possible to 16300 Christensen Road, Suite 207 Tukwila, Washington 98188 commute from suburban homes to jobs in the city. 206-467-7088 In the 1960’s, the city entered a period of decline, as the pace of suburbani- fax: 206-467-6957 zation accelerated with the construction of Interstate 5 and the second float- www.researchcouncil.org ing bridge. From 1960 to 1980, Seattle’s population fell by more than WRC Page 2 Millions 63,000, from 557,087 to 493,846. Over the same period 2.5 100% the number of King County residents outside of the city King County Outside Seattle 90% Seattle more than doubled, from 377,927 to 776,052. Seattle’s 2.0 Seattle % of County 80% share of county population fell from 59.6 percent to 38.9 70% percent. 1.5 60% Following 1980, Seattle again began to grow, and by the 50% 2000 census its population exceeded the 1960 peak. De- mographers with the state Office of Financial Manage- 1.0 40% ment estimate that the city added nearly 39,000 residents 30% from 2000 to 2009. 0.5 20% The share of King County residents living in the city has 10% continued to fall, however, and is now below 32 percent. 0.0 0% 1900 1910 1920 1930 1940 1950 1960 1970 1980 1990 2000 2009 EMPLOYMENT HAS MOVED TO THE SUBURBS Chart 1: Seattle and King County One might expect that Seattle’s recent population growth would be accom- Populations panied by growth in employment in the city. However, as Seattle’s popula- tion grows, increasing numbers of city residents choose to commute to suburban jobs. In March 2008 Seattle had nearly 7,900 fewer private sec- tor jobs than it had in March 2000. In contrast, over the same period, the area of King County outside of Seattle added more than 34,000 private sector jobs. Most of this growth occurred in six key suburban cities—Bothell, Kirk- land, Redmond, Bellevue, Issaquah and Renton—that form a crescent to the east of Lake Washington. These six cities, which we dub the Suburban Six, sit in the same labor market as Seattle and are strong competitors to Seattle for firms wishing to tap this pool of labor. Chart 2 graphs indexes of private employment in the month of March for Seattle and the Suburban Six from 2000 to 2008. In each case, March 2000 employment is indexed as 100. Table 1 on page 3 presents the underlying employment data, which come from the Puget Sound Regional Council. For more on the derivation of these data, see the sidebar on page 3. Between March 1995 and March 2000, private sector job growth in Seattle Chart 2: March Covered Employment (76,849) slightly exceeded job growth in the Suburban Six. Since 2000, Private Industries, 2000 = 100 the pattern has been very different. 115 The bursting of the dot-com bubble and the collapse of demand for commercial airplanes following the 9/11 terror Suburban Six 110 attack combined to make the Seattle area the epicenter of Seattle the 2001 recession. On a percentage basis, job losses were 105 greater here than in most other parts of the country. The 2009 Projections loss of private jobs was particularly large in the city of Based on 100 Countywide Seattle, and it has yet to fully recover the private sector Decline employment it lost during the recession. 95 Monthly employment data from the state Employment Security Department (ESD) indicate that for King County 90 as a whole the dot-com recession began in January 2001. Countywide employment was a bit higher in March 2001 85 Mar Mar Mar Mar Mar Mar Mar Mar Mar Mar than in March 2000. For Seattle , however, March em- '00 '01 '02 '03 '04 '05 '06 '07 '08 '09 ployment was lower in 2001 than in 2000. For both Seattle and the Suburban Six, 2004 marked the bottom of the cy- cle in employment. The percentage loss in private employment from 2000 to 2004 was greater for Seattle than for the Suburban Six (10.8 percent WRC Page 3 versus 5.1 percent). From 2004 to 2008 employ- About the Employment and Wage Data ment growth was much stronger for the Suburban Neither the U.S Bureau of Labor Statistics nor the state Depart- Six than for Seattle (16.2 percent versus 10.1 per- ment of Employment Security (ESD), which are the primary cent). For the Suburban Six, private employment sources of data on employment in the state, track employment was 10.3 percent higher in March 2008 than it had on the city level. been in March 2000; for Seattle, it was 1.9 percent The city-level employment and wage data we use in this brief lower. are provided by the Puget Sound Regional Council (PSRC). The PSRC is a regional planning agency whose members include In both Seattle and the Suburban Six, private em- counties, cities, towns and Indian tribes in King, Kitsap, Pierce and ployment has declined sharply since March 2008. Snohomish counties . The PSRC will not release March 2009 employ- The ESD provides PSRC with individual firm records from the Quar- ment estimates until next spring, so we cannot yet terly Census of Employment and Wages (QCEW) for the first quar- precisely quantify these declines. To give a sense ter of each year. PSRC staff then determine a specific geo- of the impact of the current recession, we show on graphic location for each job enumerated in the QCEW. The PSRC has published job counts based on this methodology by Chart 2 projected employment for March 2009 as- city and by census tract for March of the years 1995 and 2000 to suming that employment in both Seattle and the 2008. Suburban Six drop by 4.3 percent from March The QCEW is based upon administrative records from the state’s 2008 to March 2009, which is the amount by which unemployment insurance system and encompasses all jobs cov- ESD estimates countywide private employment ered by unemployment insurance. The PSRC employment counts fell. therefore exclude self-employed workers, proprietors, chief ex- ecutive officers and other non-insured workers. Typically, cov- Chart 3 shows the changes in the number of jobs ered employment has represented 85 to 90 percent of total em- by industry. (Because the PSRC has suppressed ployment.