Don’t Mess With Texas; Learn From It

Mike Brownfield / October 22, 2010

While the United States struggles to escape a recession — and California is plagued with a massive fiscal crisis — there is one outlier posting big job growth numbers, all while keeping taxes low and government small: Texas.

In a new study, the Texas Public Policy Foundation finds that though Texas, like the rest of  America, is suffering the effects of the great recession, “its economic decline in the state has been milder than in California and the rest of the country,” and “The Texas economy has been growing stronger, with less negative volatility, than California or the nation overall.”

Job creation is one of the Lone Star state’s bright spots. In the last year, Texas saw the creation of 119,000 jobs between August 2009 and August 2010 — more than half of all jobs created in the United States — while California saw a loss of 112,000 jobs. And while Texas has seen a 2.3 percent decline from its peak employment, it fared better than the United States’ 5.7% decline and California’s 8.7% decline. (more…)