Of the 19 local economic indicators we track through our Minnesota Valley Business magazine, 11 moved in to negative territory and 8 moved in a positive direction comparing late last year with 2008.
Some surprises: The number of people employed in the nine counties of the Mankato region was actually up some 1,600, about about 1.3 percent. The number of people without jobs also grew, by about 600, or 9.3 percent.
A complete story will appear in Sunday's Free Press, and details to 27 overall indicators we track can be found in our Minnesota Valley Business magazine. You can subscribe by contacting our reader service department at readerservice@mankatofreepress.com
Other positive indicators included Mankato residential building permits, Mankato/North Mankato housing starts, vehicle and retail sales, and soybean, corn and hog prices. Indicators that were negative included commercial construction, home sales (by just 1 percent), dairy prices, the hotel business, unemployment claims, foreclosures and the unemployment rate.
Still, there seems to be a little psychological undercurrent of worry among retailers we talk to. Home improvement material buying seems to be slow.
When the complete figures come in for December, it will be interesting to compare it to last year. The retail economy, bar and restaurant business downtown is getting more competitive all the time with new eating and drinking places opening up this year.
So some of the pressure retailers may be feeling might not be economy pressure, but pressure from more businesses competing for the same size pie.
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