Forecast: Ventura County economy to contract further in 2017
Ventura County’s economy is expected to contract further in 2017, declining by nearly 1 percentage point. That is the prediction of the California Lutheran University Center for Economic Research and Forecasting, which will present its forecast on Oct. 26.
The CERF report says the dominant economic story to emerge in Ventura County over the past year is the decline in total economic output. Its forecast for growth in 2018 and 2019 is positive but quite low with an average of 0.35 percent over those two years.
The amount of jobs in agriculture, production, construction and other tradable goods-producing sectors should continue to decline. Jobs in non-tradable services sectors like health care will see continued growth.
A contraction in GDP came out to a $1.2 billion decline from 2015 to 2016. The largest decline was in nondurables manufacturing, which fell by $960 million, and accounted for 82 percent of the total decline.
“Given the difficulty and costs of doing business in Ventura County, we can only surmise that more contractions will continue,” the report said.
CERF Executive Director Matthew Fienup will present the entire report at 1 p.m. on Oct. 26 at the Serra Center in Camarillo.
• Contact Robert Shutt at rshutt@pacbiztimes.com.
