Utah Economy will Continue to Slow Down

Feb 13, 2008 by Jeff Robinson

(KCPW News) New estimates from the Department of Workforce Services show Utah's economy slowed down earlier last year than economists previously thought. After readjusting its data for last year, the department says the slowdown began in September, not November.

Chief economist Mark Knold says the biggest slowdowns happened in construction, banking and natural resources, all thanks to lenders tightening up their standards after the subprime mortgage fallout. He says Lehi was hit hardest, seeing a virtual shutdown in construction of any new homes.

Utah's employment growth has dropped to 2.8 percent, half a point below the long-term average held since 1950.

Knold says an explosion in the number of college graduates entering the workforce kept us insulated to some degree for the last three years, but that now we can't avoid a continuing decline in job growth along with the rest of the country.

The department hasn't seen evidence of layoffs except in construction, but says that it's easily possible we could see layoffs in other industries.

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