Story at a glance
- A Moody’s Analytics index has tracked the country’s economic recovery since the pandemic began based on 13 metrics, including the value of goods and services produced, employment, retail sales and new-home listings.
- Moody’s latest numbers through the end of June show seven out of the 10 leading states voted Republican.
- Data show the 10 states closest to the pre-pandemic normal are Connecticut, Rhode Island, Nebraska, South Dakota, West Virginia, Montana, Iowa, Idaho, Oklahoma and Nevada.
Republican states are leading the way in terms of economic recovery since the beginning of the pandemic, according to recent analyses. But a host of factors, including remote working options and early pandemic statewide environments played a major role in how quickly a state could return to the pre-pandemic normal.
A Moody’s Analytics index has tracked the country’s economic recovery since the pandemic began based on 13 metrics, including the value of goods and services produced, employment, retail sales and new-home listings.
Moody’s latest numbers through the end of June show seven out of the 10 leading states voted Republican, while separate data show that U.S. residents are relocating en mass. Their top choices, according to the data, are Republican led.
Data show the 10 states closest to the pre-pandemic normal are Connecticut, Rhode Island, Nebraska, South Dakota, West Virginia, Montana, Iowa, Idaho, Oklahoma and Nevada.
A separate Moody’s analysis of 46 million people who moved to different U.S. zip codes in a 12-month period ending Feb. 2022 shows Florida, Texas and North Carolina leading a group of Republican states welcoming the most new residents, according to The Wall Street Journal.
This migration may be partly attributed to flexibility made possible by remote working options, allowing people to move to less-expensive locales, Moody’s analyst Matt Colyar told Changing American in an interview.
“What we’ve seen is a noticeable effect of the migration trends that everybody’s talking about, whether it’s housing, home prices or what have you,” Colyar said.
“And that’s going to more affordable areas whether this is a lot of the Southwest, Southeast Mountain West, those states have had an influx of people and that’s at the expense of places in the Northeast in the Midwest, and with fewer workers.”
Republican states are also gaining the most jobs, according to separate Brookings Institution analysis of federal data, viewed by WSJ. The analysis shows states that have voted for Republican candidates the past two presidential elections gained the most jobs at 341,000. Blue states, meanwhile, were short by 1.3 million as of May.
Moreover, May data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics shows 12 states with Republican-led legislatures recorded record low unemployment rates.
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“The normal that we’re measuring is probably unattainable at this point. And there’s just behavioral changes that are sticky,” Colyar said.
“We’re likely chasing something that isn’t going to happen, and our index is measuring something, behaviors that are likely changed permanently,” he concluded.
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