Sustained but modest job growth through 2017

(The Boston Globe, November 13, 2013)

The Massachusetts unemployment rate is projected to decline to 5.2 percent by mid-2017. Earlier this year, Massachusetts had regained all of the jobs lost in the last recession, but the economy has since created jobs more slowly than expected. Economic expansion in Massachusetts should solidify next year and begin a period of steady but modest job growth, according to a new forecast. It estimates employment in the state will increase at an average annual rate of 1.4 percent, or about 45,000 to 50,000 jobs a year, through 2017.