The year-end job creation numbers from the United States Bureau of Labor Statistics are a total humiliation again for the state of Maryland, and Montgomery County. Our rival across the Potomac River, Virginia, created twice as many jobs as Maryland in 2024. Virginia added 76,900 jobs last year, while Maryland created a paltry 38,400 jobs by comparison. In the closing month of December 2024, Virginia added 4,900 new jobs, while Maryland added a laughable 200. That's a 2 with only two zeros after it.
“Virginia’s labor market continues to demonstrate resilience and growth, with a strong increase in nonfarm payrolls, a growing labor force, and low unemployment,” Virginia Governor Glenn Youngkin (R) said in a statement. “Our commitment to business-friendly policies, reducing costs, and fostering innovation has created an environment where both Virginia companies and Virginians can thrive.”
Virginia was named America's top state for business in 2024 by both CNBC and Business Facilities magazine. The latter is a professional journal covering the topic of corporate headquarters relocation. While the Old Dominion has added multiple major and Fortune 500 corporate HQs this century, Maryland was a loser in all of those competitions. Among those choosing Virginia over Maryland were Northrop Grumman, Nestle, Intelsat, Lidl, Gerber, Volkswagen, Amazon, and Hilton Hotels. Here in Montgomery County alone, our elected officials have failed to attract a single major corporate headquarters in over 25 years.
Who can forget the Montgomery County Council laser-focusing on a bill to ban circus animals on the very day that Discovery Communications was sealing the deal with two other states to move their HQ from MoCo to their cities? Or the Council canceling the biggest transportation project in White Flint on the very day that Amazon representatives were touring that area during their HQ2 search, which we lost to...Virginia? Scrapping your biggest transportation project the same day that a logistics-obsessed firm like Amazon is visiting: Sheer genius! Heckuva job, Brownie!
While Maryland Governor Wes Moore (D) is promising higher taxes and fees, and a 75-cent charge on every Amazon and food delivery order, Youngkin is asking the Virginia legislature to cut taxes on his constituents and businesses. Virginia has made major investments in new transportation infrastructure and site development, all while keeping taxes lower than Maryland.
Maryland elected officials, by contrast, have blocked every meaningful congestion relief project, and have directed Maryland State Highway Administration officials to increase congestion by placing absurdly-low speed limits on major commuting state highways. They've even ordered MDSHA to remove vehicle lanes from many of those highways, including Old Georgetown Road, Georgia Avenue, and University Boulevard in Montgomery County alone.
Rather than invest in site development for corporate campuses, and high-wage research and manufacturing facilities, MoCo and Maryland leaders have instead turned such valuable land over to their developer sugar daddies for new stack-and-pack residential housing. Taxes? Nobody in the region pays more than Montgomery County taxpayers.
Given the history of Virginia decimating Maryland in job creation this century, the only surprising thing about the 2024 numbers is that yet another historic drubbing of Montgomery County and Maryland officials is not being covered by the local media. Failure and incompetence are never brought to busy voters' attention. We can still enjoy the irony that Montgomery County's international business trips are - bizarrely - most often to Communist countries like China and Cuba, but that failures in policy and economic growth of the magnitude we find in Maryland often result in removal, or even jail, in those nations.
28 comments:
Queue "if you don't like it here, move" messages. Or, "all those jobs in Virginia dont pay as much as our (non) jobs." We won't hear "How do we fix this?" from our elected (Elrich, just barely) 'leaders.' Not to worry, Moore will just raise taxes on the people we most need to keep here.
Meanwhile Youngkin is pandering for Trump this week, in a state that voted for Harris in the same week that he mocked the victims of the plane/helicopter crash and wrecked the morale of Virginia's federal employees. Not a good look,
Between Moore and Alsobrooks, we are going to rue the day we don't have Hogan waving the MD flag. The Baltimore and PG influence will leave us third behind CA and NY in the loser category!
Love that slam dunk pic! Kudos ! Keep it up!
How do you not get tired of writing the same blog post over and over? VA and MD both have (or at least had, prior to Trump) great economies. Both are growing well, have (or, again, had) miniscule unemployment rates, and good paying jobs. The whole "Maryland - with the highest average income in the US and a 3% unemployment rate - sucks!" schtick is so idiotic. Whatever happened to this site posting useful stuff about Bethesda?
You must realize that the population of Virginia is nearly 50% larger than Maryland? This would account for a good portion of the difference in job growth between these two states. About 8,500,000 folks live in Virginia, while just over 6,000,000 live in Maryland.
7:01: Gov. Moore himself has repeatedly admitted that Maryland's economy is stagnant. Didn't you see his press conference?
Once again, income and unemployment rate are irrelevant to job creation and economic growth. The jobs that generate those incomes and employment status are largely located in Northern Virginia and D.C.
Montgomery County long ago fell out of the Forbes Top Ten Wealthiest Counties in America list.
9:23: I don't think you'll find many economists who would find that explains our disastrous job growth numbers. Even taking that into account, our job number would have been much higher. It wasn't.
Everybody knows white boys can't jump.
How will Robert Dyer fix this? No one votes for him, he has no demonstrated leadership or job creation, and his only "solution" is building a Bridge To Nowhere and not building bicycle facilities. While calling everything he doesn't like "Communist".
1.4% job growth for 2024 put us in the top half of US states and is higher than almost every year of Hogan's reign. Who do you think you're fooling with this "disastrous job growth numbers" BS?
And weren't you just talking on here about how great Florida is doing? Their job growth was almost identical to ours in 2024. So, which is it, Dyer? Is Florida "moribund," too, or is Maryland doing fine?
It certainly was stagnant under Hogan. As you note, Maryland just added nearly 40,000 jobs in 2024 alone - clearly the opposite of stagnant. The question is, how bad are things going to turn in 2025? I was furloughed today, along with my 500 Bethesda coworkers, so we'll see is Trump is just pooping in the pool for fun or if he's trying to ruin the country for real.
11:16: Not only did Virginia add twice as many as Maryland, but Pennsylvania added 105,500. Hogan failed to bring any major corporate HQs to Maryland, but his power was so limited by the Democrat-controlled legislature that he can't carry much blame. He cut tolls and blocked tax increases when he could, but few of his other initiatives were ever allowed to move forward.
Things could go either way nationally, but that's why we need to position ourselves for growth at the state level, and be an attractive destination for business.
11:11: Half as many jobs as Virginia, and a third as many as Pennsylvania? Sounds disastrous to me.
Florida added 147,900 jobs in 2024. Maryland added a moribund 38,400.
Trust me, you don't want to use Florida as a comparison argument!
Even if Montgomery County didn't have all the jobs, the argument was it's a better place to live than Northern VA. Now, with home prices increasing 2x+ in the past decade, it's harder to live in Montgomery. Paltry inventory of affordable homes currently.
People sleeping out overnight to bid on million dollar townhomes.
The council is stuck in the past with no broad remedies for residents.
Robert Dyer @ 12:29 PM: Florida's number of jobs added is 4 times that of Maryland. Florida's population is... also 4 times that of Maryland. Is it really that hard to do basic arithmetic?
It's hilarious that someone on here actually thinks the "Brownie" comment is a racial epithet.
10:29: A bridge from I-370 to Dulles isn't a "bridge to nowhere."
2:55: Your novel "we have this many people, ergo we create a corresponding number of jobs" argument was already disproven in your comparison of Maryland and Virginia.
It is so weird that you simply refuse to acknowledge that different states have different sized populations and economies.
Anyways, if Hogan was still in office we all know how differently this blog post would have read. Since Moore's in office, you try to pretend that adding 40K jobs and being in the top half of the country for job growth are bad things. You're not fooling anyone.
8:43: If your population argument was valid, Maryland would have created many more jobs. It didn't, so clearly population size does not determine job growth.
Hogan was a disaster in economic development. The difference is that O'Malley and Moore have full partisan control in Annapolis. So if they fail, it's not because their agenda was blocked by the legislature, as Hogan's was. They succeed or fail on their own talent and competence.
Thanks for acknowledging Moore gets full credit for these 40,000 jobs. He's doing great. We'll see if that changes now that the region and country have Trump to contend with. Hopefully not.
Mr. Dyer, it seems that you are having trouble with the concept of RATE of job creation. If State A has four times as many residents as State B, and State A creates four times as many jobs as State B, then both states have identical RATES of job creation.
Once again, and extremely basic numerical concept, which for some reason, you are unable to grasp.
And not a clue what to do from the right. They got nothing.
7:49: Yeah, we're giving Moore credit for doing half as good a job as Youngkin, and a third as good as Shapiro. Not exactly a stellar performance, nor "great."
9:47: Now you're moving the goalposts a second time, but even playing Devil's Advocate, your 2nd alternative measurement still doesn't add up. Based on population, that rate of job creation figure would also have to be higher for Maryland than it is.
MD is a smaller state. Didn't other people already explain that to you? Are you also surprised MD created fewer jobs than California? Or China? You are so dumb.
4:29: LOL, this Virginia vs. Maryland job growth topic has been discussed for over a decade, and no one has ever tried to argue population size as the reason for Maryland's stagnant growth. The same stagnant growth Wes Moore lamented and gave as justification for new taxes and fees last month, following his "great" economic development record for 2024 you claim he had.
"Population is destiny" seems to be a new talking point devised at a recent cartel staff meeting, but let me save you from much future embarrassment by letting you know that your "population theory" is in the same file as "peak oil" and "Y2K."
For the fourth time, I will point out that - even under your theory - Maryland would have had to create more jobs than it did to match the growth rate Virginia enjoyed last year. Conversely, Maryland - thanks to the federal government - created more jobs than some states that have larger populations last year, again debunking your novel argument that "population is destiny." In other words, yes, Maryland was crushed by Virginia and Pennsylvania in job growth last year.
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