By Susan Roth
Advertiser Washington Bureau
It will be no surprise to Hawai‘i residents, but a new Internet report based on employment figures shows the state fared worst of all 50 states during the Clinton administration.
Colorado came out on top in the analysis to be released today by Demographics Daily, an online newsletter. That state expanded its employment base by 4 percent a year, nearly twice the national rate of job creation, from November 1992 to November 2000.
In Hawai‘i, meanwhile, employment grew by only 300 jobs a year in the same period — or 0.1 percent, according to the report.
Only the District of Columbia fared worse than Hawai‘i, losing 6,000 jobs a year in the Clinton years, likely due in part to the administration’s elimination of many federal jobs.
The South and Mainland West made the greatest employment advances during the period, the report said.
For much of the 1990s, Hawai‘i’s unemployment rate was nearly twice that of the national average as the state struggled with sluggish job growth in a protracted economic downturn. However, job growth is estimated at 2 percent this year.
To generate the state-by-state ranking, the editors used a 100-point rating system based on a state’s jobless rate, number of jobs created during the past eight years and how those statistics compared to the Reagan and Bush administrations.
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