State said to weather economic storm so far

Most panelists at a June 3 WisPolitics.com- WisBusiness.com forum on the state economy said despite the business slowdown and high gas prices, the state economy itself wasn’t in recession.


Department of Revenue economist John Koskinen pointed to the state’s dipping unemployment rate, for example. And First Weber CEO James Imhoff said despite national housing woes, state real estate numbers in 2007 were still historically high and not as bad as many media reports suggested.

But state Rep. Patricia Strachota, R-West Bend, said of her constituents: “It may not be a recession, but they are feeling the pain.”


And the June 3 announcement that the GM plant in Janesville would close brought renewed fears of a sustained economic turn-down.



The event was presented by AARP Wisconsin.

Participants in “The Wisconsin Economy in a Time of Uncertainty” event:
Bill Smith of NFIB-Wisconsin, Scott Lockard, U.S. Bank, Madison market president, James R. Imhoff, Jr., chairman/CEO. First Weber Group, Inc., Bill Duddleston, director of the Center for Economic Education at Edgewood College, Department of Revenue Administrator of the Division of Research and Policy John Koskinen, and State Representative Patricia Strachota, Chairwoman of the Assembly Committee on Jobs and The Economy.