Metro GDP: Plenty of Room for Growth

The U.S. Department of Commerce’s Bureau of Economic Analysis has issued statistics on real gross domestic product for 292 metropolitan areas in 2015. Nationally, growth was 2.5 percent. But disappointingly, just one of New Mexico’s four metro regions exceeded the figure for metro regions as a whole.

Surprisingly, Santa Fe saw growth of 4.4 percent, but GDP was lower in 2015 than it was in 2010:

At 2.0 percent, Albuquerque performed second best, but GDP was still below what it was in 2012:

Las Cruces dropped by 0.4 percent, and was well below its 2010 mark:

Farmington, which had been growing in recent years, saw a dip of 2.0 percent, driven by tough times in the oil-and-gas sector:

Grab hold of whatever positive figures you can from the new data, but there’s no questioning the fact that New Mexico simply hasn’t clawed its way out of the Great Recession yet. When it does, perhaps the days of perpetual budget deficits and consistently dismal employment numbers will disappear.