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What are the forces moving the Minnesota economy? Adam Belz tries to identify the trends and show the connections between Minnesota and the larger U.S. and global economies. You can connect with him on Twitter: @adambelz

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Roseville-based Horton Inc. added 20 export markets, gets some props

Posted by: Adam Belz Updated: April 24, 2013 - 9:12 AM

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A Roseville-based airflow systems manufacturer called Horton Inc., was honored by an undersecretary of commerce for selling its goods in 20 new export markets in the past two years. Francisco Sanchez of the U.S. Commerce Department visited the company April 22 and gave the firm an “export achievement certificate.”

Horton now has customers in Belize, Democratic Republic of Congo, Dominican Republic, El Salvador, Ghana, India, Iraq, Israel, Jamaica, Japan, Kuwait, Malawi, Morocco, Namibia, Nicaragua, Nigeria, Panama, Peru, Philippines, Tunisia, United Arab Emirates, Uzbekistan, Venezuela, Vietnam, Zambia and Zimbabwe.

The federal government is keen to recognize successful exporters, after President Obama in 2010 set a target of doubling U.S. exports by 2014. The goal is optimistic. American exports would have to rise 20 percent each of the next two years. In 2012, they rose 4.3 percent. “It’s a stretch goal,” Sanchez said, but “we can really move the dial if we have communities around the country that are pushing their own initiatives.” 

The Twin Cities has its own initiative, and an office of the U.S. Commercial Service promoting exports. Gov. Mark Dayton announced in March 2012 an initiative designed to double exports from the Twin Cities by 2017.

That too would now be a rosy projection. To reach that goal, businesses in the metro area would have to increase exports at a pace of 15 percent each year. Minnesota exports were up 7 percent in 2011, and growth flattened in the fourth quarter of 2012.

Canadian ambassador: Keystone pipeline should be approved

Posted by: Adam Belz Updated: April 19, 2013 - 4:17 PM

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As the battle over the Keystone XL pipeline sharpened this week in State Department hearings in Nebraska, Canada’s ambassador to the United States called for the State Department to approve the project in a speech in Minneapolis.
 
Speaking to the Minnesota International Center on the 50th floor of the IDS Center, Gary Doer said the pipeline would produce fewer greenhouse gas emissions than transporting oil by train, and would draw the U.S., Canada and Mexico closer to the goal of North American energy independence.
 
“To us, it’s part of an energy vision,” Doer said. “That will be a huge gamechanger in terms of geo-security issues for the United States and for North America.”
 
Oil from the Middle East and Venezuela would become less crucial, the pipeline would create jobs and allow Canadian firms to get oil to market more easily, and it can be built safely without causing more harm to the environment, he said.
 
The pipeline would travel from the Canadian border at Morgan, Mont., through North Dakota and South Dakota to Steele City, Neb. It would be 875 miles long and carry oil from Alberta and North Dakota ultimately to refineries on the Gulf Coast.
 
The State Department issued a draft of an environmental impact statement last month, finding that blocking or approving the pipeline — either way — would fail to substantially affect greenhouse gas emissions or slow the controversial extraction of oil from northern Alberta’s tar sands. The report also said aquifers on the Great Plains would not be at risk from the pipeline, and the project would create 42,000 jobs directly and indirectly.
 
Environmental groups like the Natural Resources Defense Council have rejected some of the State Department’s findings, arguing that the pipeline would lead to a spike in oil extraction from Alberta, where the oil that’s pulled from the sand produces 17 percent more greenhouse gases per barrel over its life cycle than an average barrel of oil.
 
Doer said Friday that he sides with the State Department’s report. The State Department held hearings over the pipeline in Nebraska this week, and eventually will decide whether the project moves forward. 
 
“The State Department correcly pointed out that oil from Canada will not increase greenhouse gases if the pipeline’s approved, because it’s now basically coming down on train,” Doer said. “In fact, trains will have an 8 percent higher greenhouse gas (emissions) than a pipeline. So this is part of making the United States energy independent from the
Middle East, it’s part of displacing unreliable oil from Venezuela, it creates 42,000 jobs, and in Minnesota, a lot of your oil comes from Canada.”
 
Alberta oil sands operations have greatly cleaned up their process in recent years, Doer said. 
 
“We believe in clean air and clean water, and we’re going to have to keep working on it,” he said.
 
The rapid rise of oil shipment by rail has complicated the argument over the pipeline, and has clear Minnesota implications. Canadian National and Canadian Pacific, two railroads with big stakes in Alberta, both have U.S. entry points in Minnesota. Both railroads have been investing in tank cars and oil-loading terminals. Canadian National increased its oil shipments six-fold in 2011. Excluding those two railroads, U.S. petroleum shipments by rail have spiked 56 percent so far in 2013, to 202,173 carloads through April 13, according to the Association of American Railroads.
 
This increase in rail oil traffic has risks. A Canadian Pacific train carrying oil from Alberta derailed about 20 miles north of Alexandria, Minn., on March 27, spilling roughly 350 barrels of oil into the snow. The Wall Street Journal reported 112 oil spills in the U.S. between 2010 and 2012, up from 10 in the previous three years, though the volume of spilled oil has declined since 2008.

March was dreary for Minnesota jobs market

Posted by: Adam Belz Updated: April 24, 2013 - 9:15 AM

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It took a cold spell to snap a hot streak.
 
Minnesota's endless winter helped cool off the job market in March, as employers cut 5,200 jobs, a sharp dip after seven straight months of gains.
 
The monthly jobs report, issued Thursday by the Minnesota Department of Employment and Economic Development, also showed that February gains were less robust than initially thought, revised downward from 14,500 jobs to 9,900.
 
Construction and weather-sensitive restaurant and retail hiring were weak compared to March 2012, said Steve Hine, the state's labor market economist, and they will likely be weak when the April numbers are revealed in a month.
 
“I’ve got to say, looking out the window, that we may see an extension of this weakness into April’s numbers,” he said, on a day when it snowed heavily.
 
The unemployment rate improved to a seasonally-adjusted 5.4 percent, largely because more people stopped looking for work, dropping the state labor force participation rate to 70.8 percent. That's near the record low, 70.7 percent, set in September 2012.
 
The job losses are also in line with national trends. The Bureau of Labor Statitistics said earlier this month that the nation only created 88,000 jobs in March -- far below average and below analyst expectations.
 
In Minnesota, education and health services shed 2,900 jobs in March, only the second month in the past 24 in which the sector lost jobs. Government, financial services and manufacturing also declined. 
 
Trade, transportation and utilities, construction and professional and business services added jobs on the month. 

Kauffman Foundation: Minnesota ranks last in business creation in 2012

Posted by: Adam Belz Updated: April 18, 2013 - 9:32 AM

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Minnesota found itself in last place among states on a measure of entrepreneurial activity released Wednesday by the Kauffman Foundation.
 
Entrepreneurial activity declined in 2012 across the United States. The number of businesses created per month fell by about 29,000 compared to the year before, and the Midwest was the weakest region.

Roughly 150 out of every 100,000 Minnesotans is an entrepreneur, according to the report. The U.S. average, 300 per 100,000, is double Minnesota's rate.

What this means is complicated. Dan Carr, who runs the Collaborative, a group that helps growing companies get bigger, said Minnesota has done poorly in past Kauffman surveys. Also, the medtech sector, which moves slowly even in good times, is weak.

Patrick Steele, a Minneapolis guy on Twitter, had another theory for the low ranking: 

Typical Minnesota woman earns about 80 percent what the typical man earns

Posted by: Adam Belz Updated: April 4, 2013 - 4:58 PM

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The National Women's Law Center issued a report this week on the gender wage gap across the country, and it's still significant.

The typical American woman working full-time, year-round makes 77 cents for every dollar earned by the typical American man.

On average, a woman in Minnesota is paid 80 cents for every dollar earned by a man, slightly better than the national average.
 
The wage gap in Minnesota, as it is in the rest of the country, is even wider for African-American and Hispanic women, who earn 63 cents and 53 cents, respectively, to every dollar paid to white, non-Hispanic men.
 
The state with the greatest disparity for women overall was Wyoming, and the place with the least disparity was the District of Columbia.
 

 

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