Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: FRIDAY, June 1, 1990                   TAG: 9006010644
SECTION: EDITORIAL                    PAGE: A-8   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: 
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

THAT ROANOKE AREA JOBLESS RATE

The April figure, smallest since the Virginia Employment Commission began keeping current records in 1974, may seem reasonable in comparison with Northern Virginia's and Charlottesville's incredible unemployment rates. Theirs dropped respectively to 1.6 percent and 2 percent in April.

Even so, 2.3 percent here represents a nice fall from March's 3.4 percent and the 3.3 percent monthly rate in April a year ago.

Curiously, by traditional standards, it also signifies more than full employment. (Economists posit a certain figure, say 4 or 5 percent nationally, that is supposed to represent the normal turnover in the labor force, the core unemployment that remains constant through business cycles. When you reach that level, you're supposed to have, practically speaking, full employment.)

Roanoke Valley employment may not be quite as full as Northern Virginia's, but it's fuller than full. To be sure, there are the usual seasonal factors to consider: Some construction workers went back on the job in April. College students hadn't joined the labor force yet. Some recent layoffs came after the April survey.

Still, the valley's employment has grown by 1,500 jobs in a year - to 126,700 in April 1990 from 125,200 in the same month last year. Meanwhile, the state jobless rate has declined to 3.4 percent, the best for April in 17 years.

All in all, not bad.

It's nice, by the way, that Northern Virginia's unemployment figure dropped in tandem with ours. Now politicians and business leaders in the southwestern part of the state can continue to cite the rate differential as cause for building economic bridges between regions. The hope is to spread wealth around by bringing some of Northern Virginia's surplus jobs to the armies of eager job-seekers presumably camped in the Roanoke Valley and Southwest Virginia.

Well, not armies. Squads, more like it. The size of the labor force - that is, people who show up in the employment statistics by holding jobs or looking for work - isn't expanding here.

And that's the fly in the ointment. According to Virginia Employment Commission statistics, the size of the valley's labor force in April was smaller than in March, smaller than in April of last year. And it diminished on annual average from 1988 to 1989.

If a labor force shrinks, the unemployment rate goes down, all other things being equal. Which is why the Roanoke Valley's unemployment rate is a little deceptive. Some residents have given up the search for jobs, thereby leaving the labor force. But the more basic problem is the valley's population growth, measured in something less than leaps and bounds. The threat of stagnation, of becoming an economic backwater, has not shrunk in tandem with the joblessness rate.

Yes, the employment base here has remained relatively stable. But that speaks to the number of jobs, not to their quality or pay. All but a relative few Roanoke Valley residents looking for work can find it. But too many are looking for and finding it elsewhere - in places like Northern Virginia.

Celebrate for now the 2.3 percent unemployment rate. It's good news, and a sign the local economy remains vibrant. But don't rest complacently on that. Rest too much and the Roanoke Valley could sleepwalk into an economic nightmare.