While Virginia added about 6,000 jobs in March according to one employment survey, another said 15,000 fewer Virginians were employed — more than any other state and the District of Columbia, according to US Labor Department figures released last week.
The figures are not interchangeable, though both are conducted through the US Bureau of Labor Statistics. Local Area Unemployment Statistics, which come from a household survey of people, said that just under 15,000 fewer people were employed in Virginia in March than in February.
While LAUS counts people with jobs, rather than the jobs themselves, the Current Employment Statistics surveys employers. It counted 6,000 more jobs in Virginia.
Maryland had the second-largest drop in the LAUS, of about 7,000 employed. The two states have a larger share of federal employees, possibly signalling the first indicators of the effects of federal layoffs.
Virginia Secretary of Labor Bryan Slater said in an interview Monday that the CES contained the most important takeaway in last week’s jobs numbers.
“I think the fact that companies are hiring, and you've got a net increase of almost 6,000 jobs shows that Virginia's economy is continuing to grow and to weather some of the uncertain times relatively well,” said Slater in an interview Monday.
The month-over-month drop in the LAUS survey is a decline of about 0.3% — making Virginia 50th out of 51, only ahead of Rhode Island. Virginia had the largest decline of any state in terms of the number of people employed.
The commonwealth’s federal government jobs decreased by 4,100, according to the state agency Virginia Works.
Levi Goren, director of research and education policy at The Commonwealth Institute, a progressive organization, told VPM News that despite significant monthly fluctuation in employment data, weaker revenue collections in March and federal layoffs could signal a trend.
“Together, that does paint a picture that we're starting to see some negative impacts in Virginia for families from the federal job cuts and also cuts to grants and contracts,” Goren said. “While there is significant monthly fluctuation, this comes together with what we know is happening, and I think is likely a real trend.”
In a release last week, Republican Gov. Glenn Youngkin pointed to growth in the CES figures, and mentioned the decline in employment in the LAUS survey further down in the release.
A clearer portrait of the commonwealth’s economy in the wake of changes in the federal bureaucracy and trade policy should emerge in the coming months.
Virginia’s Q4 is the most crucial quarter for the state’s revenue — April, May, June — when Virginians file their state and federal taxes. And the Richmond Federal Reserve’s Beige Book, which surveys economic sentiment (rather than hard numbers), is scheduled to publish later this week. (Virginia’s fiscal year runs July 1–June 30.)
“One advantage of the surveys of business confidence and consumer confidence is that they are more current and more forward looking than this data,” said Goren.
In the March revenue letters, Virginia Finance Secretary Stephen Cummings said general fund revenues were still ahead of forecast. The commonwealth also has revenue reserves that can compensate for lost revenue due to a recession.
“We don't have a shortfall yet, and Virginia is in a very strong overall fiscal position, with a large amount of money saved in our rainy day funds,” said Goren. “A lot of families and communities are hurting in different ways right now, and I think Virginia should think about how it can help.
So far, the Youngkin administration has mostly focused on connecting laid-off federal workers with open jobs, and resisted calls to oppose the reduction of the federal bureaucracy. Slater said 11,218 participants and 451 employers have attended the administration’s job fairs, yielding 15,596 applications for 15,364 jobs.
