CU economists: ‘Slowed fears’ for recession heading into late ’24

BOULDER — Recent economic data has “slowed fears (about whether) we are going into a recession” during late 2024 or early 2025, Richard Wobbekind, senior economist at the University of Colorado’s Leeds School of Business, said this week while discussing the results of the latest Colorado Secretary of State’s Quarterly Business and Economic Indicators report. 

The data, while reflecting certain ongoing headwinds, “demonstrates Colorado’s continued economic growth and resiliency,” Colorado Secretary of State Jena Griswold said. 

Colorado’s economic indicators were mixed in the second quarter of 2024, as the labor market expanded — albeit more slowly than in recent periods — and inflation tempered, while new business filings shrunk and business dissolutions soared.

Colorado was ranked 19th in the nation for the pace of job growth, 47,100 jobs since the second quarter of last year, good for an expansion rate of 1.6%.

“The state has benefited from a comparatively high labor force participation rate (4th-highest in September 2024), but slow net migration to the state and demographic shifts could strain the pace of job growth,” the economic indicators report said. 

Colorado is experiencing a “period of slow migration to the state” and “the impact of retirees is already impacting our state’s growth” in the form of an aging workforce, CU Business Research Division executive director Brian Lewandowski said.

Gross domestic product in the Centennial State grew 2.7% quarter over quarter in the most-recent period, placing Colorado 31st in the nation.

For personal income growth, the state ranked 39th, with 5.1% expansion over the year.

In the Denver metropolitan statistical area, inflation grew by 1.4% year over year in September, cooler than the 2.4% nationwide inflation figure. 

“We have inflation cooling, we have incomes rising. We have GDP and employment looking very healthy at this particular point,” Wobbekind said.

A total of 41,622 new business entity filings were recorded in the second quarter, down 5.3% year over year and 3.3% quarter-over-quarter.

There were 181,587 existing-entity renewals in the most recent quarter, a 3.3% year-over-year increase and 2.3% bump quarter over quarter.

Dissolution filings for businesses totaled 13,221 in the third quarter of 2024, up 15% from the same period last year.

When viewed holistically, the economic data indicates that Colorado is “poised for continued growth for the remainder of this year and well into 2025,” Wobbekind said.

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