Michigan: Highest unemployment; residents flee state

Michigan's unemployment rate in 2007 hit its highest level in 14 years, losing a total of 90,000 jobs as the state draws near to what everyone hopes is the bottom of a very deep hole.
Worse than jobs disappearing is the fact that tens of thousands of residents are, too. A total of 40,000 people vanished from the state's labor force -- signs that the state's economy has been weak for so long that many potential workers simply quit the state to try their economic luck elsewhere.
The preliminary 2007 average jobless rate for Michigan was 7.2 percent, the highest since 1993 when the annual rate hit 7.4 percent, according to data released Wednesday by the state Dept. of Labor & Economic Growth.

The December unemployment rate also reached a troubling high of 7.6 percent, up two-tenths of a point from November's 7.4 percent, the highest rate in the nation.
The national unemployment rate for December was 5 percent; the national average jobless rate for the year was 4.6 percent.
As expected, the auto sector lost the most jobs in 2007, about 19,000, followed by 16,000 construction jobs as the housing market continues to reel from the subprime mortgage crisis. And retail jobs, shaken by lagging consumer spending, were down by 10,000.
The one sector that grew was education and health services, which gained 9,000 jobs, mainly in health care, state data shows.

Read the article at DetNews.

What a shock...our residents are moving out of state because there is no work here. Granholm can't blame any of this on Engler any longer, as she has been in office way too long already. Hire a COO to help run the state? I'm surprised we had money to even do anything like that. Why can't our legislature do anything about that? Why do we need a COO to help run our state? Because we have an ineffective Governor. Enough said...