Springfield, Illinois falling

Education and Health Service workers peaked in mid 2016

Federal government workers in Springfield were relatively unaffected by recessions, but gradually declined, partly as a result of advances in technology.

Finance and Insurance were also consolidated and made redundant due to rapid communication technology advancement.

Goods producing peaked in 2000, then bottomed out in 2013. The one glimmer of hope is the gradual upswing of local production since 2014.

Still, only about 7 or 8 thousand people work in goods producing.

Health care and social service work is growing as the needs of an aging population must be met. This peaked in 2016.

Information technology was slow to make its way from the coasts to the Midwest. By the time it finally appeared to come to fruition, the dot-com bubble busted. Fiber optic cable was the new rage which allowed companies to consolidate their offices in the big cities, leaving satellite offices to languish and vanish.

Leisure and Hospitality survived for a while, but the Internet reached speeds enough to stream full feature-length films for under $5, and fully interactive long-distance teleconferences reduced the need for travel, among many other innovations. Remember when "Staycations" were promoted to inspire local road-trips?

I'm not familiar with what's happening to our local schools, but the gradual decline of education professionals since 2011 in Springfield is ominous.

Local government employment positions have been steadily declining since 2010, and the city budget still has a shortfall in 2018.

Cutting jobs in this sector means infrastructure must be neglected, like our city sewer system. The costs will be insurmountable when they inevitably must be addressed.

This field started increasing in 2012, but only slightly. Why? There's been a lot of development recently. Businesses have been relocating farther west with new construction, abandoning their old haunts along Dirksen and MacArthur in Springfield, for Jerome's Wabash Avenue strip, and west beyond Veterans Parkway

Not sure what they mean by "other" services, but there seems to be around 6,000 people in these positions. Still not quite as much as mid 2008, but still climbing. This must be related to the new "Gig Economy" Like Uber, etc.

I was surprised to see that up to the recession of 2008, retail was slowly declining since 1992. Probably due to the influx of big-box retailers like Walmart and Best Buy, then Online shopping at Amazon. The rebound after the recession is enigmatic, but as you can see the drop after 2016 appears as rapid as the drop directly following 2008.

The only jobs that cannot be out-sourced are service sector jobs. This number seems too high since Springfield officially has a population only around 117,000 by 2018.

Many State government jobs were moved from Springfield to Chicago during the period around Rod Blagojevich's term as Governor. This removed a serious amount of disposable income from circulating in Springfield's economy.

All Employees - Trade, Transportation and Utilities in Springfield, IL

The title of this chart suggests these jobs were mostly occupied by union trade professionals. Electricians, Plumbers, Truck Drives, HVAC. There was a brief surge in 2015 but the decline continues.

I think these were the wholsale suppliers of building materials in Springfield.

All employees, wholesale trade in Springfield, Illinois

All Employees: Total Private in Springfield, IL

I found this number counter-intuitive at first, but more jobs are becoming part-time or temporary with many people working multiple jobs. It seems employees here are being double or triple counted.

Average hourly earnings goes up when individuals work multiple jobs, but even this peaked in 2017.

Average Weekly Earnings

Average Weekly Hours of all private sector employees in Springfield, Illinois.

Even as people take on more jobs, the hours seem to be falling away.

The Civilian labor force in Springfield seemed to exceed the population at certain points. I was skeptical at first until I realized that many people have more than one job. Some even have more than 2 jobs.

The unemployment rate in Springfield, Illinois seems to be dropping as the civilian labor force is also dropping.

There are fewer jobs and fewer people looking for work.

This chart seems to indicate that a lot more houses have been on the market for upwards of 3 years, but home prices continue to rise despite the surplus.

The surplus in housing could have a negative impact on residential construction jobs.

Data gathered by Zillow here reflects the real estate tax base. Most people in these other communities come to Springfield, use Springfield's infrastructure daily, most likely work in Springfield too, then go home at the end of the day. Is that fair to those who remain in Springfield?

Rent has been climbing steadily since 2005, yet the vacancy rate bottomed out in 2014 and is on the rise