The devastating blow dealt to New York City by the current recession has been less painful to Brooklyn according to the Brooklyn Chamber of Commerce’s 2009 Brooklyn Labor Market Review released today and highlights how certain American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) dollars are affecting the borough and how Brooklyn has experienced job growth in some sectors in spite of losses citywide.  The Chamber commissioned the Fiscal Policy Institute to analyze the borough’s labor and economic landscape.   

“Brooklyn continues to weather the economic storm and will emerge well-positioned to resume growing,” said Carl Hum, president and CEO of the Brooklyn Chamber of Commerce. “The borough shows strength in a number of sectors, such as professional services, tourism, retail and educational services.”

“Even though our economy continues to contract, job losses in Brooklyn continue to be at a far slower pace than the rest of the city,” said Dr. James Parrott, chief economist for the Fiscal Policy Institute.

Borough’s Growth Eases Squeeze
Brooklyn’s unemployment rate has increased significantly in recent months as it has for the rest of New York City. According to the Review, a significant part of the unemployment rate rise in Brooklyn results from continued growth in the labor force. The Review notes total personal income in Brooklyn is projected to decline for the first time in at least 40 years, partly because of the large number of borough residents working in the city’s high-wage financial services sector. Because of the concentration of jobs in the health, education and social services sectors, which experienced slight growth, job losses in Brooklyn are projected to be much less than the citywide decline. In fact, while the Review projects New York City overall will lose 115,000 jobs in 2009, Brooklyn’s job loss is expected to be 8,500, a 1.9 percent decline, which is about half that of the city overall.

In the first quarter of 2009, the borough added jobs in educational support, school bus transportation, child day care, doctor’s offices, home health and residential mental health facilities in 2008, with an estimated 20 percent increase over the first quarter of 2008 in design and management consulting jobs, eight percent in architecture and six percent in accounting. 

Recent expansion in the borough’s retail sector is good news since the borough, for years, has been “under-retailed” compared to the national norm as reported in the 2006 Review. At that point there were six square feet per capita of retail space compared to 19 or 20 feet in other states. The 2009 Review shows that Brooklyn now has one in every five retail jobs in New York City (Brooklyn has about one in every seven private sector jobs in the city). The Review also projects that Brooklyn will lose 1,000 retail jobs this year, compared to 10,000 citywide.

Further, the opening of new hotels, the increase in housing and restaurants – all of which meet the needs of the growing borough – are projected to help keep employment flat in these sectors that traditionally suffer in a downturn.

ARRA and Brooklyn
For the first time anywhere, the 2009 Review breaks down how the ARRA is impacting Brooklyn. The federal initiative meant to breathe life into the slumping national economy is pumping about $300 million into Brooklyn-based infrastructure projects, the largest of which is the rehabilitation of Brooklyn Bridge ($47.2 million). Additionally, Brooklyn will receive 4.65 percent or about $186 million of the national allotment of ARRA funds dedicated to public housing renovation projects. Meanwhile, the borough will benefit from $722 million in ARRA funding earmarked to provide temporary payments to the unemployed and other individuals (this includes unemployment insurance, food stamps and social security payments). These payments to Brooklynites represent 0.97 percent of the national total of this dedicated ARRA funding stream compared to Brooklyn’s 0.84 percent of the national population.

”Thanks to our federal legislators and advocates, Brooklyn truly benefited from the Federal stimulus package.  The funding will improve our infrastructure, create jobs and help stabilize the incomes of the borough’s economically-challenged households,” said Mr. Hum.

Click here to download the 2009 Brooklyn Labor Market Review.

Pictured above: James Parrott, chief economist, Fiscal Policy Institute discusses the Brooklyn Chamber's 2009 Brooklyn Labor Market Review findings.