Is having a Republican governor better for a state’s economy? According to a report by financial analysis website Market Watch, the answer appears to be “yes.”
“Nine of the 10 fastest growing U.S. states in the fourth quarter of 2013 were controlled by Republicans governors, according to the most recently available data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics,” wrote Market Watch’s Jeffry Bartash. “Six of the 10 worst-performing states, on the other hand, were run by Democrats.”
The trend also appears to extend much further than just the most recent data available.
“[T]he Republican advantage does not appear to be a one-quarter quirk,” Bartash explained. “States led by Republican governors have also fared better since the end of the Great Recession in mid-2009. Seven of the 10 fastest growing states, including the top seven, were run by Republican governors for all or most of the period from 2010 to 2013.”
But in spite of the fact the Alabama has been under a Republican governor during that same time period, the state’s economy has not faired quite as well as many of its GOP-led counterparts.
As a matter of fact, Alabama had the fourth-worst performing economy in the country in the last quarter of 2013, with anemic growth of 0.7 percent.
And Alabama’s next door neighbor, Mississippi — also under Republican control — performed even worse. Its economy actually shrunk by 3 percent, the worst performance in the country. The economies of Minnesota (0% growth), Iowa (0.3%) and Massachusetts (0.4%) also faired worse than the Yellowhammer State.
Additionally, Alabama has recently held the unenviable distinction of being the only state in the country where the unemployment rate has risen over the last twelve months.
So is Alabama’s economy really lagging that far behind?
When attempting to get a good read on the economy, it is important to gather as much data as possible, rather than relying on one data point, like the unemployment rate, to reach a conclusion.
The Obama Administration, for instance, loves to tout that the unemployment rate has been dropping. However, they don’t like to talk about the fact that people giving up on finding a job and dropping out of the workforce all-together is one of the major reasons for the drop. President Obama is not the first president spin the numbers to his advantage, and he won’t be the last.
On the flip side, it would be easy to start taking shots at Gov. Bentley for the rise in Alabama’s unemployment rate, but there is plenty of evidence that the bump in unemployment is at least in part due to workers optimistically re-entering the workforce. Trying to explain that won’t win you any arguments in a political landscape dominated by 5-second soundbites, but that doesn’t make it any less reasonable.
It is also important to realize that governors — Republican or Democrat — are far from the only variable when it comes to a state’s economic performance.
North Dakota, which led the country with 8.4 percent growth in the fourth quarter of 2013, is reaping the benefits of a fracking oil-boom. Lower taxes, less regulations and few labor unions have fueled growth in some states, especially in the South. And the broader U.S. economy also plays a significant role in the economic performance of individual states.
But governors are still the faces of their respective states, and voters hold them accountable more than any other state-level official when it comes to jobs and the economy.
Gov. Bentley has had a string of high profile economic development successes since taking the reins of Alabama’s economy in 2011, perhaps most notably Airbus and Remington. But a lot of research suggests that it is the growth of small businesses, rather than the occasional big business splash, that sustains economic growth over time.
Alabama’s business climate continues getting high marks, and Gov. Bentley has proven himself to be an able recruiter of companies from both inside the United States and around the world. But for all the positive momentum, Alabama is still lagging behind.
It may well be a testament to how far we’ve come that we’re no longer ok with just beating Mississippi. But we’re not. And in a second Bentley term in which he has promised to not just be a “caretaker governor,” his number one challenge will be setting Alabama on a real, long-term path to economic growth and prosperity.
Follow Cliff on Twitter @Cliff_Sims
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