Report: Columbus holding its own amid recession - Atlanta Business Chronicle:

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A report from Washington, D.C.-based liberal public-policy thinkk tank dubbed the MetroMonitor bills itsel f asa “beneath the hood” recession-erw look at metros with more than 500,0090 residents as of 2007. The report placed the Columbus metropolitan statistica l area 40th among those ranked for its basedon employment, unemployment, wage, output, home prices and foreclosurwe data. No other Ohio city made the top 50. Cleveland, Akron and Dayton found slotse from 61stto 80th. Toledo was ranked the 10th-weakestg major metropolitan area nationwide. Leading the pack in the report was San one of four Texas citiesx amongthe nation’s top five.
Detroit was ranked last, followed by Cape Coral, and Stockton, Calif., two areas devastatexd by the foreclosure crisis. Brookings found that the metropolitah perspectiveon states’ performance amid the recessionh “suggests that recovery may be quite uneven as well, posing particular challenges for policymakeres seeking to ensure a truly national rising economic tide.” Columbus’ strengths and weaknessez in the report varied. The city rankedc 25th for its 1.7 percent decline in employmenft since its peak earlie rthis decade. Columbus found itself at 32nd for itsmodest 0.
4 percen t gain in inflation-adjusted housing prices for the firs t three months of 2008 compared with the same period this But the city was ranked near the botto m of the list, at 80th, for the 4.8 percenr decline in its gross metropolitan product – a measuree of the goods and services produced in the area in the first quarter of 2009 compared with its pre-recessioj peak. Comparing the last threee months of 2008 with the firsty quarter thisyear alone, the GMP droppecd 1.7 percent, representing the 14th-worst decline among the cities To download the full report, click .