How about that recovery?

Maine Unemployment Rate Drops in April is what the headline flashed in Friday's Portland Press Herald. From 8.2% all the way down to 8.1%. A mere rounding error. What the story failed to point out is what really matters: 6,500 jobs were lost in Maine in April. As the chart above shows, this U-turn in the jobs number means that we have not even hit bottom yet. Expect another thousand or more jobs to be lost before July 1 as school districts pare down for the coming fiscal year.

Bottom line: the state's revenue projections for FY2011, already bleak, may need to be revised downward once more.