A new analysis conducted for the National Retail Federation
shows that new rules on overtime proposed by the U.S. Department of Labor would particularly affect management and
professional employees in low-wage states and in rural areas where income and
the cost of living are lower than the national average.
The Athens
Banner-Herald is reporting that under the proposal, most individuals
making up to $970 a week anywhere in the country would automatically receive
overtime pay at time-and-a-half when working more than 40 hours a week, up from
the current $455. The Labor Department chose $970 under a formula intended to
give overtime to the lowest-paid 40 percent of full-time workers nationwide who
currently receive a fixed salary.
But in 10 states – Alabama, Georgia, Hawaii, Idaho,
Kentucky, Nevada, North Dakota, South Carolina, South Dakota and Texas – that
dollar figure would bring at least 45 percent of full-time salaried workers
under overtime rules. Another eight states – Arkansas, Florida, Louisiana,
Mississippi, North Carolina, Oklahoma, Tennessee and West Virginia – would see
at least 50 percent covered. The figure works out to the intended 40 percent in
only one state, Maine.
The salary threshold would also be indexed, raising it to
$1,400 by 2017 under one option proposed by the Labor Department. Within three
years, only 22 percent of current salaried workers would remain exempt from
overtime.
“This proposal has been spun as a way to raise the income of
struggling workers but there are places where bankers or stockbrokers could be
turned into hourly workers,” NRF Senior Vice President for Government Relations
David French said. “The Labor Department has ignored the fact that the
cost-of-living varies throughout the country.”
Unsurprisingly, officials in some of those cities and towns were not
pleased to see their localities appear on that list.
"Dublin is the regional hub for about 15 counties in Middle Georgia from a
labor and employment standpoint. So if there's been a more successful community
for job creation in this state, I'd like to know about it," according to
Brad Lofton, development authority president in Dublin, as quoted by WMGT-TV.
On its website, Zippia says it used the following
criteria to determine its list:
·Unemployment rate
·Recent job growth
·Future job growth
·Sales Tax
·Median household income
So how did Zippia use statistics to come to its misleading conclusions?
Unemployment rate
Confusing employment with jobs is a common mistake. The unemployment rate is determined by an estimate based
on households. By definition, it measures where people live, not where they
work.
It is much better to measure relative job opportunities by
looking at the number of jobs growing or declining in an area, not the number
of people employed in that area.
Cochran Mayor Michael Stoy makes a good point in the same
story when he says, "We are looking at a large percentage of our
population that goes up to Warner Robins."
When BLS or the Georgia Department of Labor counts a new job, that job is counted in the community where it is created. When a statistical agency counts the number of employed or unemployed, they are counted based on where the people live not where they work.
For example, my neighborhood, in a suburb of Atlanta, has only houses in it, so by definition,
it would be regarded as a bad place to get a job since the neighborhood is residential with no businesses. Residents have jobs
outside the neighborhood, so their jobs are counted where they go to work. If they commute to Atlanta, the job is counted as located in Atlanta, but they are counted as employed in my neighborhood. If a resident loses a job in Atlanta, they would be counted as unemployed where they live, in my neighborhood in this example, not in the City of Atlanta.
There is an undeserved negative connotation in listing a
place as “worse to get a job” if the people in that area commute elsewhere for
employment. Unless you believe that everyone should work out of their homes, using unemployment statistics to measure job growth is a poor choice.
Recent job growth
Recent job growth (or decline) should be the number one, and
perhaps, only criteria to determine “worst places to get a job.” It is hard to
know the data used by the site in determining job numbers because they are very
general in their description.
For example, it says about Fitzgerald, Ga., “The city ranks
as having the weakest recent job growth.”
Hard to judge based on that general statement, which is more
definitive than some of the statements for other cities and towns on the list.
Here is where hard numbers and some definitions would help.
Future job growth
The Bureau of Labor Statistics produces an occupational
outlook for the United States, and the Georgia Department of Labor produces a
similar report for Georgia.
Beyond these two reports, job forecasting for small
cities and towns is much more problematic.
It is true that smaller areas in Georgia have not seen the
growth of the larger metro areas such as Atlanta, and that is worrying, but it
is difficult, if not impossible to accurately forecast growth for a particular
small area.
This is even truer for smaller areas, because an area with a small employment
base can be radically affected by the opening or closure of one establishment.
I also don’t know how much into the future they are attempting to forecast, but it is hard to make an accurate forecast of job growth in a small area beyond 6 months.
It is easier to forecast larger areas, such as states, than smaller areas like communities where small changes can have large impacts.
Sales tax
I have no idea how sales tax relates to getting a job, and I
don’t know if they are speaking about the amount of sales tax or the growth
rate of the tax. I am sure the site has some way of using these data, but it is
not obvious.
Median household
income
Poorer areas tend to have fewer services, and jobs in poor
areas tend to pay less. That impacts the salaries for jobs, but not the number
of jobs themselves. The “study” was to be about the worst places to find a job,
not a study of the areas with the lowest paying jobs.
The two criteria are not
the same. Georgia is growing faster than many states with higher median household income.
Hopefully, the web site does a better job of finding
employment for people than giving advice.
Job losses in Georgia counties
Below are two tables that may be more useful than the information provided by Zippia.
The first shows the largest net job
losses for Georgia counties in 2014. The second shows the largest percentage
job losses in Georgia counties in 2014. There is some overlap, but many of the
counties on each list are different, as you might expect. Both tables are looking back on 2014, not forecasting the future.
As a comparison using
the same source, Georgia, as a state, added 147,335 job in 2014 for a growth rate
of 3.7%.
Table A. Net job losses in calendar year 2014
Baldwin -708
Colquitt -453
Telfair -338
Dawson -255
Upson -253
Thomas -242
Marion -200
Stephens -199
Dodge -165
Elbert -151
Table B. Percentage job losses in calendar year 2014
Marion -12.8%
Talbot -10.2%
Telfair -9.0%
Wheeler -8.9%
Heard -6.4%
Clay -4.8%
Twiggs -4.5%
Baldwin -4.5%
Glascock -4.3%
Webster -4.0%
Data obtained from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics Quarterly
Census of Employment and Wages.
