From JP Morgan (via MNI):
"the Texas Workforce Commission recently reported that nonfarm employment dropped by a huge 25,400 in March, a decline the magnitude of which hasn't been seen since mid-2009"
"Texas had been averaging job gains of 34,000 per month last year. The March decline follows a sharp slowing in January and February ... occurred alongside a big deterioration in Texas business sentiment. Moreover, the elevated level of jobless claims in Texas on into April suggests that monthly job losses could persist past March"
That's very bad news for Texas, but how does it impact on measure of US economic growth as a whole?
JPM go on (bolding mine):
"Job losses of the size Texas experienced last month are rarely seen outside of recessions. Looking at things from the demand side, there are also indications the Texas economy may be near contracting. At the national level, cutbacks in oil and gas-related capex could shave about 0.5%-point from Q1 GDP growth"
The "Baker Hughes rig count (which is used by BEA to estimate this category of investment) indicates that just over half of the reduction in rig count has occurred in Texas. Given Texas' 9.2% weighting in the national GDP, this means oil & gas capex alone could be taking about 2.7%-points off of Q1 GDP growth in Texas, a big hole to get out of to achieve positive growth."
