Per the RGA:
While Democrat gubernatorial candidate Ned Lamont continues to run on Governor Dan Malloy’s failed agenda, eight years of job-killing Democrat policies are taking their toll on Connecticut’s economy.
A new report by the state’s Department of Labor describes Connecticut as the “only state to continue losing economic activity even since the end of the recession” and that “lackluster economic growth has resulted in anemic revenue growth in the state, leading to years of budgetary constraints.”
Despite this, Lamont has made it clear that he would raise taxes on Connecticut families, doubling down on Malloy’s job-killing agenda. After two terms of decline under Democrat control, Connecticut needs a new direction, not a Malloy Enabler who will lead the state further into decline.
The Hartford Courant reports:
“Connecticut’s economic decline during the recession and immediately after was due to steep losses in the key industries of manufacturing and financial activities, the state Department of Labor reported Thursday.
‘Connecticut is the only state to continue losing economic activity even since the end of the recession,’ Manisha Srivastava, an economist at the state Office of Policy and Management, wrote in the latest issue of the Connecticut Economic Digest. ‘This lackluster economic growth has resulted in anemic revenue growth in the state, leading to years of budgetary constraints.’
Adjusted for inflation, the state’s economy is the same size as in 2004, leading to slow revenue growth and frequent state budget crises…
The declline in financial activities — which include finance, insurance and real estate — has removed $8.3 billion from the economy after contributing $22.6 billion in the decade before the recession, Srivastava said.
Of that industry, the largest declining subsectors were insurance and securities and financial investments.
The state’s still struggling economy, despite some promising developments in aerospace and defense jobs, is one of the primary issues in the campaign for governor. Five Republicans and two Democrats will face off in primaries next month as candidates compete to demonstrate they are the best to lead Connecticut out of the economic stagnation under outgoing Gov. Dannel P. Malloy…
Connecticut’s job growth since the recession is 4.6 percent and is one of the few states yet to recover all jobs lost during the recession, Srivastava said.
The state lagged in job growth compared with western Massachusetts and upstate New York, Srivastava said as she tried to determine the role of cities in the loss of jobs.
‘Many of the issues that affect Connecticut also affect upstate New York, including slow population growth, decades long loss of manufacturing jobs and the exit of larger employers,’ she said.
Srivastava said Connecticut’s job growth after the recession is similar to what occurred in upstate New York despite tax increases in Connecticut in 2009, 2011 and 2015.
The analysis of Connecticut’s economy by industry ‘shows that if a few sectors had performed differently after the last recession, Connecticut could have turned declines into real (economic) growth,’ she said.”
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