The January employment estimates are always delayed for statistical reasons, so some of the key data was just released last week.
Employment is generally a lagging indicator of economic conditions, and that lag is compounded this time of year by the late reporting of January numbers.
Those issues aside, there was promising news for the Savannah metro area in these most recent numbers.
Recent revisions show more robust job growth in 2013 than previous estimates had shown. I had been puzzling in this column off and on for many months about the persistently weak numbers despite the visible signs of investment.
According to the revised estimates, the Savannah Metropolitan Statistical Area (Chatham, Effingham and Bryan counties) surpassed the pre-recession peak of employment in late 2013.
That’s better news than had been previously reported, but keep in mind the metro population has grown since 2007. The local job market remains in a state of recovery.
And there are still some reasons for worry. For example, in January 2014 there were 2,079 claims for unemployment insurance in the Savannah metro area, up 16 percent from January 2013.
Statewide, unemployment claims fell 19 percent from a year ago.
Between January 2013 and January 2014, the Savannah metro added 4,300 jobs, a healthy increase of 2.8 percent.
Private sector employment actually increased 3.7 percent, but that gain was tempered by federal and local government job losses.
As I have noted in previous columns, federal employment in the area has fallen pretty sharply in recent months, and it seems likely that more cuts are on the horizon.
Employment in hospitality in the Savannah area increased by 10.6 percent over the last year, and there were also solid gains in professional and business services; transportation, warehousing and utilities; retail trade; and financial activities.
We also saw slight improvement in the number of manufacturing jobs, although the sector that includes construction continued to shed jobs in 2013.
We might not see any surge in homebuilding in 2014, but a number of large commercial projects seem likely to boost construction employment.
From January 2013 to January 2014, there was a statewide increase in jobs of 2.0 percent, despite continued struggles for a number of metro areas.
As we have seen in previous months, much of the statewide improvement was due to healthy growth in the Atlanta metro area, but Savannah’s rate of annual job growth bested all Georgia metros in January.
Of course, January is always a weak month for employment, so we’ll be watching the labor market indicators closely to see whether this apparent rebound continues into the spring.
City Talk appears every Sunday and Tuesday. Bill Dawers can be reached via billdawers@comcast. Send mail to 10 E. 32nd St., Savannah, GA 31401.