Western New York ECONOMIC NEWS

The mission of Western New York Economic News is to provide analysis and forecasts of economic trends in the Buffalo-Niagara Falls Metropolitan Statistical Area and contrast these trends with those in New York State and the nation. The report is prepared by George Palumbo, PhD and Mark Zaporowski, PhD, Julie Anna Golebiewski, PhD, and other members of the Economics and Finance Faculty at Canisius College, Buffalo, NY.

Summary

Extraordinarily accommodative monetary and fiscal policy supported a relatively quick recovery from the Covid-19-induced recession. The inflationary consequences of these aggressive policies, interacting with increased input costs related to global supply chain interruptions, resulted in a 4.85% increase in CPI inflation in the second quarter of 2021. Post-recession income and employment growth failed to keep up with the nearly complete recovery of GDP. Regionally, the Buffalo MSA did not lead the nation into this pandemic related recession, and currently has recovered employment ahead of the rest of New York State, an aberration in the pattern that held over the last 40 years. While unemployment rates have fallen substantially since July 2020, the labor force had 10,000 fewer individuals in July 2021.