November 12, 2007

Santa Clara County Stats (Sep'07)

(c) View from Silicon Valley, 2007.  All rights reserved.



Last months' (Aug'07) statistics were more than a little "off."  For the first time since we started monitoring this report back in September, 2003, the following were completely omitted:
>Total Jobs
>Air Passengers (Ku)
>Air freight Tonnage (M)
>Ofc/R&D space for Lease (Ku)
>% office space for lease

The local paper reported these figures 48 straight months --until last month.

Also missing from the August report were "MN150 Stock Index" and "NASDAQ Index."  However, we only recently started tracking these and were not too concerned.  (Not to mention the fact that the paper changed "MN150 Stock Index" from an Index-like value of 2,054, as recently as April, 2007, to a valuation expressed as "$1.36T" beginning June, 2007.  It's tough to build a database when the underlying data is changed more-or-less at random.

Now in the September, 2007 data, these missing figures are back.

Ironically, we have issues with not only the numbers but the commentary supplied by the local paper.

The items highlighted by SJMN with this month's data were:
+Home sales slowed but the median price held on to a year-over-year gain.
---Anybody reading our site, or any of several others, already knows the median statistic is meaningless when sales volume is collapsing.  (As of this week, y-o-y volume is down -37% y-o-y and over 50% compared to 2005.)

+Bankruptcy filings dipped.
---This number is very noisy on a month-to-month basis, making a one-month excursion meaningless.  September's 349 is indeed lower than August's 413 but still higher than 329 in June.  (Not to mention this stat was omitted in July.)

+Construction project approvals fell from their highest level in more than six years.
---Again, monthly figures are noisy.  Expressed another way, this month's construction figure spiked last months and reverted to more typical levels in September.

+Airport traffic slowed.
---Yes, the number fell nearly -20% from last month.  In fairness, however, the y-o-y figures was less than -2%.

+Hotel business slowed.
---Another noisy number, which is also somewhat seasonal.  Yes, it's down -18% from the month before but only -5% y-o-y and is even +5% compared to September, 2005.

+Job Growth Weakened.
---OK, here's one where we can finally agree.  At 915.6K jobs, all the headlines proclaiming job growth since May were wiped out.  September is only 1.4Ku ahead of April or 467 jobs per month for the last five months...

Conclusion:
Our review finds a number of problems vs. the paper's slant on these statistics.  As we keep repeating, always study the actual underlying numbers.  Then make up your mind for yourself.