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Total personal income rose
modestly in both rural and urban
Idaho in 2010 after
significant recession-imposed declines in 2009.
The U.S. Bureau of Economic
Analysis on Tuesday estimated personal income
for Idaho’s
five metropolitan areas at $34.7 billion, up 2.7
percent from a year earlier, while personal
income in the remaining 33 rural counties rose
2.6 percent to nearly $15.9 billion.
Statewide,
personal income – the total of wages, salaries,
business profits, investment earnings and
transfer payments like retirement, Social
Security and unemployment benefits – rose 2.7
percent.
Typically, the range in
income growth – or loss – is significant between
rural and urban Idaho.
The last time the two performed so similarly was
1978 when both rural and urban growth was 15.4
percent
But the way rural and urban
Idaho got to similar
growth rates was significantly different. Wages
and salaries in the 11 urban counties were up
1.4 percent after falling almost 7 percent over
the two previous years while wages continued to
fall in rural Idaho,
dropping 0.8 percent in 2010 after falling 2.5
percent in 2009.
Last year rural farmers and
business operators posted a 13 percent increase
in their income compared to 5.3 percent for
their urban counterparts. Urban business
proprietors suffered losses the two previous
years while rural business operators had a huge
27 percent loss in 2009.
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Personal
Income, 2009-2010 (in thousands)
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2009
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2010
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%
Change
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Idaho
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$49,245,029
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$50,564,758
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2.7%
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Urban
Idaho
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$33,773,488
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$34,697,254
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2.7%
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Rural
Idaho
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$15,471,541
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$15,867,504
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2.6%
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Boise
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$20,586,515
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$21,101,965
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2.5%
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Coeur d'Alene
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$4,428,438
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$4,514,253
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1.9%
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Idaho Falls
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$4,112,656
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$4,269,237
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3.8%
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Lewiston
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$2,071,953
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$2,172,356
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4.8%
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Pocatello
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$2,573,926
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$2,639,443
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2.5%
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A 17 percent increase in
farm earnings and a more than 9 percent jump in
earnings from health care fueled personal income
growth in rural Idaho, but the increases were
offset by losses in construction, manufacturing,
retail trade, financial services, real estate
and entertainment.
In urban
Idaho, growth was more
muted with modest increases spread over every
sector except construction and real estate.
Earnings from government
were down throughout the state.
The biggest income gain
among the urban areas was in
Lewiston at 4.8 percent
while Coeur d’Alene
posted the smallest at 1.9 percent.
Four of the five metro
areas suffered declines in personal income in
2009. Pocatello
remained essentially unchanged from 2008 to
2009.
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