Economic Recovery in Missouri

I recently read an article on cnbc about the different states and when they could expect to come out of the recession. Unfortunately, the state of Missouri is in the final 31 states, with recovery expected to begin in the second half of 2010. The central part of Missouri where I live, has been one of the hardest hit during the recession. Like a lot of Missourians, I am currently unemployed and am actively seeking employment. I haven't given up hope of finding a job, quite to the contrary. My place of employment went out of business on January 10th of this year and it was not until the past month that I got my first interview. However, I've had other interviews since and one coming up this week. Although I didn't get any of the jobs I've interviewed for, I was a top runner for the last job, so things are looking up.

With marginal improvements in the banking system and improvement in the stock market, I think it's quite possible that we might actually see recovery from the recession a bit earlier than predicted by cnbc's article. Central Missouri should be one of the first areas of the state to recover, since our local economy hosts a tremendous amount of state workers. While the state's government is suffering from the downturn, state employment has remained relatively stable, when compared to the rest of the job market. While I wouldn't look for too many raises for state employees anytime soon, at least they have jobs and benefits. A great deal of my job search efforts have been directed towards landing a job with one of the state agencies. Fortunately for me, I could take any state job offered, at any pay rate and do fine financially.