With Tuolumne County’s unemployment rate down one full percentage point, from 14.5% in April to 13.5% in May, several wonder if economic recovery is truly underway.
Tuolumne County Chamber of Commerce President and CEO, George Segarini, says that he has noticed a change in the mood of business owners and managers.
“Several of our local retail merchants have switched from an attitude of pessimism to one of optimism over the past year.” said Segarini.
According to Segarini, there has been a slow growth in local sales activity, which backs the change in mood of retailors.
By no means does Segarini think that a rapid recovery is underway.
“We’ve got a long ways to go,” Segarini said, “in comparison to last year, our Chamber membership continues to drop. For several reasons, we’d like to see that turn around.”
Segarini declined to state how many business have dropped their membership.
Statewide, 46,200 jobs were created last month. 30,000 were federal government jobs, a majority being temporary census workers. California’s unemployment rate dropped to 12.4 percent in May, compared to 12.5 percent in April.
The statistics were released by the California Employment Development Department.
written by mark@mlode.com
This post was last modified on 06/28/2010 3:34 pm