Red States, Blue States — And the Unemployment Map America Should Actually Read
The political pattern is visible. The economic explanation is much more complicated.
Look at the latest American unemployment map without knowing anything else about the United States.
Something immediately catches the eye.
Several states with relatively high unemployment are Democratic-led or traditionally Democratic.
California: 5.1%.
Connecticut: 5.1%.
Michigan: 5.0%.
Washington: 4.9%.
Illinois: 4.7%.
At the other end of the spectrum are several Republican-led states with considerably lower unemployment.
South Dakota is around 2%.
North Dakota is close behind.
Wyoming: 3.0%.
Iowa: 3.2%.
Georgia: roughly 3.2%.
Indiana: 3.3%.
The national unemployment rate is 4.1%.
The political temptation is obvious:
Red states work. Blue states don’t.
It is also where economic analysis should begin — not where it should end.
The correlation deserves investigation precisely because it is visible.
But correlation and causation are two very different things.
And once we start opening the numbers, America’s apparently simple red-versus-blue labor map becomes much more interesting.
The latest Bureau of Labor Statistics release shows enormous differences among state labor markets.
First problem: the exceptions
If political control alone determined unemployment, the map should divide neatly into red and blue.
It doesn’t.
Arizona, with Republican leadership, has unemployment around 4.9%.
Florida is around 4.5%.
Texas is around 4.4%.
All are above several Democratic-led states.
Meanwhile Hawaii has unemployment around 2.7%.
So already the hypothesis:
Republican government = low unemploymentDemocratic government = high unemployment
doesn’t survive intact.
There is a pattern worth studying.
There is not a universal rule.
And that distinction matters.
Second problem: California
California is perhaps the best example of why unemployment statistics can deceive.