Dashboard: Economy resilient with record labor participation, broad industry growth

The Salt Lake Chamber, in partnership with the Kem C. Gardner Policy Institute at the University of Utah, has released the June update for its Roadmap to Prosperity Economic Dashboard.

The chamber pointed to three insights from its June dashboard update:

1. Inflation continues to decline. While still high, inflation continues to cool, contributing to the Fed’s decision to pause rate hikes in June. The Fed has since indicated possible future rake hikes to reach their target inflation range. 

2. Utah’s labor force participation rate surpasses{mprestriction ids="1,3"} pre-pandemic levels. At 69.4 percent, Utah’s labor force participation rate ranks third nationally and sets a decade-high mark while still trending upward.

Utah’s median home sales price remains essentially unchanged. Economic uncertainty continues to impact Utah’s housing market as the median home sales price stabilized in April after March’s slight increase. 

The Roadmap to Prosperity Economic Dashboard is designed to support business leaders in understanding impacts on Utah’s economy. This tool prioritizes key data on the state’s economic outlook and actionable context for decision-makers. The dashboard is updated monthly.

“After several bank failures amid growing national economic uncertainties last quarter, Utah’s economy fared better than expected,” said Derek Miller, president and CEO of the Salt Lake Chamber. “With political risk fading after the debt ceiling deal, the Utah economy continues to show resilience despite talk of a national recession. Utah’s all-time labor force participation and near-total-positive territory for sector growth show our state economy is robust and growing. While concerns of rate hikes will persist through summer, consumer confidence and job growth continue to prove the adage not to bet against America, and certainly not against Utah.” 

“Utah’s economic resilience shows through this month’s dashboard with record labor participation and broad industry growth,” said Natalie Gochnour, director of the Kem C. Gardner Policy Institute. “Our state and regional economies continue to build momentum with positive job growth and strong fundamentals. As supply chains restore and markets strengthen, we can expect Utahns to show continued economic optimism.”

The dashboard can be viewed at https://slchamber.com/resources/roadmap-dashboard/.{/mprestriction}