EXPERTS FORECAST NEW JERSEY’S FISCAL CLIMATE
By Mary Diduch and Amy Rowe/RU Daily Targum
April 19, 2012
Believe it or not, New Jersey’s economy is growing — slowly, but surely — but it still lags behind the nation and other states.
Economic experts discussed the state’s recession status and their predictions for growth yesterday at the Rutgers Economic Advisory Service semiannual subscriber conference in the Civic Square Building in downtown New Brunswick.
“The economy is really growing this time, still slowly, but we do expect an increase in jobs in the state,” said Nancy Mantell, director of the Rutgers Economic Advisory Service.
She forecasts an additional 48,000 jobs to be added to the state in 2012, as well as a drop in the unemployment rate to 8.6 percent from the current 9 percent.
Mantell also predicts the state’s unemployment rate, which has hovered consistently around the national rate, to drop further to 5.7 percent — above pre-recession levels — by 2022.
