As President Barack Obama’s State of the Union Address emphasized a switch in focus at the national level to job creation, a new Franklin & Marshall College poll revealed that the economy, including employment, is the single most important issue for respondents in the vote for Pennsylvania governor.
Taxes, followed by reduced spending and debt/budget concerns, ranked No. 2 and 3 on the list.
In the race for U.S. Senate, health-care was cited as the single most important issue, followed by economic issues, including employment and the federal stimulus.
The state economic forecast and ideas for job creation were also on the agenda for the House Appropriations Committee, which held a hearing on the topic this week in Harrisburg.
Jim Diffley of Global Insight, the state’s economic forecaster, predicted that the national economy will grow at 5 percent in the final quarter of the current fiscal year, but noted that Pennsylvania is not expected to return to previous peak employment levels until July 2012. He also noted that when recovery hits the Commonwealth, the state will be facing a public pension shortfall of $5 billion.
Private sector job creation is a priority for the PA Chamber and its members, as the private sector has suffered most in the recession.
In his economics and finance blog, University of Michigan School of Management professor Mark Perry notes that since private sector employment peaked at almost 116 million jobs in December 2007 at the onset of the recession, more than seven million private sector jobs have disappeared, while during the same time period government jobs increased by almost 100,000. Perry notes that the disproportionate adverse effect of the recession on the private sector can also be seen in differences in jobless rates between the private and public sectors.
The Chamber’s message to federal and state lawmakers is simple: job creation depends on American free enterprise, and the continued ability of the private sector to effectively and efficiently operate is the key to true and lasting economic recovery and job growth. To help deliver this message, the PA Chamber supports the U.S. Chamber’s “American Free Enterprise. Dream Big” campaign. For details on how you can bolster the campaign, visit http://www.freeenterprise.com/
