Atlanta incomes sliced in 2009, report says | ajc.com

AJC:

More proof of how painful it has been: Per capita income in metro Atlanta last year fell nearly three times as much as the U.S. average.

Government data released Monday shows income falling in most American metro areas in 2009, with Atlanta down 4.8 percent – a loss of nearly a dollar in each $20.

Nationally, personal income slid 1.8 percent in 2009, according to the report by the Bureau of Economic Analysis.

Personal income includes earnings of various kinds, including paychecks, rental income, dividends and interest, as well as payments from the government. So the loss of jobs alone often does not push an area’s income down.

But in 2009, Atlanta was losing on a range of fronts, from jobs to stock holdings to home values.

The area lost 133,808 jobs during 2009, while the unemployment rate surged from 7.6 percent to 10.1 percent, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.

By early this year, the official jobless rate was 10.8 percent. Since then, job growth – tentative and modest – has begun again. But the state's most recent jobless rate was still 10.3 percent.

Of 223 metros measured in the federal report, Midland, Texas, was pounded hardest, with personal income down 8.4 percent. Among larger metro areas, the worst damage came in the bedroom communities of coastal Connecticut, where incomes fell 6.8 percent.

Other cities with sharper drops were Las Vegas, down 6.2 percent; Charlotte, down 5.7 percent; Dallas and Phoenix, each down 5.2; and Houston, down 4.9 percent.

Of the 134 metro areas with higher earnings, most came on various kinds of government payments, according to the BEA. Of those cities, less than half saw other kinds of income increase – and those gains were almost all in places dominated by military and other federal government payrolls, according to the BEA. Topping the list, for instance: Jacksonville, N.C., home of the Camp Lejeune Marine Corps base.

Posted via email from Jim Nichols for Senate Blog