June 5, 2008 — vol. 43, no 43
Mass. rides out economic slump relatively unscathed
Genzyme, which specializes in medications to treat rare diseases, expanded its Massachusetts workforce by about 500 jobs last year, and expects to add another 500 at the new facilities, spokesman Bo Piela said. The company has offices in 40 countries and sells products in nearly 100 countries.
“The real driver of our growth is the global demand for our products,” said Piela. About 4,500 of Genzyme’s 10,000 employees work in Massachusetts.
Another big Massachusetts employer, EMC, with 9,000 employees in the state, saw its overseas revenue grow 23 percent in this year’s first quarter.
But Massachusetts is hardly immune from a slowdown that threatens to derail the nation’s economy from its current anemic growth to a recession. The state has lost 3,400 construction jobs over the last six months and shed 3,200 manufacturing jobs over the last year, according to state economic data released last month.
The retail sector — which includes restaurants as well as merchandise sellers — has lost 3,100 jobs over the past year.
“We feel it first in the checkout lines and in the restaurants,” said Jon Hurst, president of the Retailers Association of Massachusetts. “The higher energy prices and falling home values are really having an impact on disposable income.”
For teenagers and others looking for summer jobs in restaurants and retail stores, the outlook is grim, Hurst said.
“It will be far worse this summer than it was last summer,” he said.
Clayton-Matthews, the UMass professor, said he expects the state’s recent run of job gains will soon end as the national slump begins to hurt the state. And he said much of the state’s growth has been limited to the Boston area’s cluster of technology firms, while rural areas continue to lag.
But the state as a whole is still expected to perform better than the nation because of its strengths in key areas.
“Our strength in life sciences and health care is clearly an advantage, and our role in higher education with all of our colleges and universities is also helping,” said William Guenther, president of Boston-based Mass Insight Corp., a public policy and economic development consulting firm.
(Associated Press)
(p1)
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