TRENTON-Although New Jersey gained 5,900 jobs in October, the state isn't getting any closer to meeting the needs of the working age population. Since the recession started in March 2001, job growth in New Jersey has been only 1.8 percent while the working age population has grown by 3.3 percent. If job growth since the recession began had just kept up with working-age population growth, New Jersey would have 58,700 more jobs than it has now. New Jersey needs 32,100 jobs per month to provide work for the growing population, not the 5,900 it gained this month.

"The fact that it could be worse is no consolation for people who need work and can't find it," said NJPP President Jon Shure. "Job growth has to be measured against standards that matter."

The data now available through October also shows New Jersey to be short of the number of jobs that supporters of federal income tax cuts projected. The president's Council of Economic Advisers predicted the tax cuts would create 5.5 million jobs in the U.S. by the end of this year. So far the total is nearly 2.74 million below that. Achieving the predicted level of job growth in New Jersey would have meant 143,400 new jobs by now. Through October, New Jersey is 45,200 jobs short.

To hit the federal target, New Jersey would have to gain 31,500 jobs per month on average in November and December. This seems unlikely to happen. In particular, the manufacturing industry has been hit hard. New Jersey has 70,000 fewer manufacturing jobs in October than in March 2001, when the recession began. A total of 41,500 of those manufacturing jobs have been lost since the recession ended. From September to October, jobs also decreased in the information and government supersectors.

All of this comes at a time when job cuts are being announced across the U.S. and in New Jersey. Employers cut over 100,000 jobs in both September and October. The last time job cuts were over 100,000 for two consecutive months was in January and February of 2003. In New Jersey, the state Department of Labor and Workforce Development posted on its website eight companies planning to lay off a total of 1,110 workers in November and December.

October Worker Adjustment
and Retraining Notification Notices

Company	City	Layoff Begin	Workers
Cingular Wireless	Woodbridge	11/30/04	387
Genpak	Cedar Grove	12/16/04	60
Popular Club Plan	Garfield	12/13/04	75
Simmons Manufacturing	Piscataway	12/20/04	99
Schnabel Engineering	New Brunswick	12/31/04	13
Charles Schwab	Jersey City	11/1/04	131
ETS	Lawrence Twp.	12/31/04	254
Lantis Eyewear	Secaucus	12/27/04	91

For more on JobWatch, go to http://www.jobwatch.org. The JobWatch analysis takes into account differences that can be expected among states in terms of job creation. EPI uses state-by-state employment forecasts of Economy.com, a leading forecaster of regional economics. Economy.com provides employment projections for each state for the fourth quarter of 2002 to the fourth quarter of 2004. Using this data, EPI calculated each state's share of the total employment growth and applied it to the projected 306,000-jobs-per month growth rate to calculate how much employment growth each state should experience if the federal government's employment projects were realized. That works out to an average of 9,000 new jobs per month for New Jersey.

Economic Policy Institute's JobWatch tracks current trends in the U.S. labor market and offers up-to-date readings on its status. New Jersey Policy Perspective is a non-profit, non-partisan organization that conducts research and analysis aimed at providing information to help inform debate in New Jersey.

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