Evansville Handles Recession Well but 10 Year Growth Reflects Population Shrinkage
The Evansville MSA ranked #117 of the 363 studied in the category of Gross Metro Product
Evansville’s Average Annual Growth Rate of 4.1% over a period of 10 years ranked #187 of the 363 metro areas studied. Surprising to some Evansville’s MSA ranked ahead of Lexington, Louisville, Indianapolis, and Chattanooga in this statistic that reflects improvement in productivity. Ranking in the last 5 are the rust belt cities of Kokomo, Flint, Saginaw, Detroit, and Springfield, OH.
Real Gross Metro Growth Rate from 2007 – 2009 had Evansville ranked at #201 with a -1.6% rate. A surprise local success story was Owensboro, KY that cam in at #56. Elkhart, IN ranked dead last at #363.
The 10 year employment change for the Evansville MSA was -3.8% reflecting the loss of population of the City of Evansville. The question is did these people leave because jobs went away or did the jobs go away because the people left?
The entire study is available at the following link.
