Global| Apr 23 2021State Coincident Indexes in March
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Summary
The Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia's state coincident indexes in March show widespread recovery, though with some choppiness. In the three months ending in March the indexes for 49 states increased (Delaware inched down). [...]
The Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia's state coincident indexes in March show widespread recovery, though with some choppiness. In the three months ending in March the indexes for 49 states increased (Delaware inched down). Michigan surged up more than 10 percent; 21 other states were up more than 2 percent. Only 7 states (including Delaware) had increases of less than 1 percent. The national gain of 1.6 percent over this period seemed reasonably representative of the state numbers, in contrast to recent experience.
Over the 12 months ending in March a dozen states recorded gains. Almost surely 12-month increases will become universal in April (comparable to the “base period” situation for price indexes). 4 states—Connecticut, West Virginia, Massachusetts, and Hawaii—had declines of more than 10 percent. Comparable to the 3-month change, 49 states saw increases from February to March, with Delaware again the outlier. There were no remarkably large gains (North Dakota's 1.5 percent was the largest).
The formula for computing these indexes is, most likely, not fully incorporating March's large payroll employment increase; in part for technical reasons, but also because at the state level job gains were reported as less strong than the headline national number (the sum of the state increases was somewhat less than the national one).
Charles Steindel
AuthorMore in Author Profile »Charles Steindel has been editor of Business Economics, the journal of the National Association for Business Economics, since 2016. From 2014 to 2021 he was Resident Scholar at the Anisfield School of Business, Ramapo College of New Jersey. From 2010 to 2014 he was the first Chief Economist of the New Jersey Department of the Treasury, with responsibilities for economic and revenue projections and analysis of state economic policy. He came to the Treasury after a long career at the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, where he played a major role in forecasting and policy advice and rose to the rank of Senior Vice-President. He has served in leadership positions in a number of professional organizations. In 2011 he received the William F. Butler Award from the New York Association for Business Economics, is a fellow of NABE and of the Money Marketeers of New York University, and has received several awards for articles published in Business Economics. In 2017 he delivered Ramapo College's Sebastian J. Raciti Memorial Lecture. He is a member of the panel for the Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia's Survey of Professional Forecasters and of the Committee on Research in Income and Wealth. He has published papers in a range of areas, and is the author of Economic Indicators for Professionals: Putting the Statistics into Perspective. He received his bachelor's degree from Emory University, his Ph.D. from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and is a National Association for Business Economics Certified Business EconomistTM.