Economist Dr. Loren Scott
Economist Loren Scott is out with his annual economic outlook of where Louisiana’s economy is headed. He tells us his team expects the state to add 110-thousand jobs over the next two years. He says, “that’s a very good number, a very large number by historical standards, but you got to remember we’re coming out of a very deep hole that we dug or was dug for us in 2020 due to the shutdown” blaming Covid-19 mainly for that.
So, in essence, Scott says the state should get all of the jobs it lost due to the pandemic shut down by the end of 2023.
As for the addition of new jobs in the state, Scott says New Orleans should do well and Baton Rouge will be getting a big shot in the arm from a major project. “The new Amazon distribution center is going to create from 2,000 to 3,000 jobs, it is just a huge win for us,” said Scott. And, he says there are upwards of eight billion dollars in industrial projects that have been announced that he believes will actually occur.
Scott says cities located north of I-10 may not do as well in the economic area, while Lake Charles, located along I-10, is struggling to dig itself out of a hole from Covid and some devastating storms. He says one of the problems for Lake Charles is that only a trickling of federal dollars has slowly come into the city more than a year out from the storms.
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