BSU Economist: Tremendous First Quarter For Economy

Ball State economist Michael Hicks says the economic growth in first quarter of the year may have been the best since the end of the Great Repression. Hicks said “With labor markets continuing their more than eight years of tightening, the unemployment rate dropped to 3.9 percent, well beneath the full employment level,”With 164,000 new jobs filled, total job creation was less robust than expected, but wages showed a 2.6% increase over the past 12 months, clearly outstripping inflation.”