I know after Chris Vander Doelen’s column in today’s paper highlighting a report from Denis Desrosiers automotive think-tank this may seem like piling-on but, CIBC recently published their “Metro Monitor” report, updated to the end of the third quarter of this year.

Mr. Desrosiers and his people see hard times for the auto industry.  Never mind the 800 new Toyota jobs (GM Transmission will take that many and more with it when it shuts down in 2010) the future of auto jobs is starting to look a lot like the North American electronics industry (RCA, Zenith, Nortel) or just about any other goods producing sector.  There will still be cars to buy (if you can afford them) - they’ll just be built somewhere else.

Highlights from the CIBC “Metro Monitor” report:  Comparing 25 Metro Areas

• Of the 25 cities 10 had negative Economic Activity Scores, with TO and Van City sliding and Halifax, Regina and Saskatoon rockin’ the top spots.
• If I listed the bottom three cities ours wouldn’t be there - Windsor scored 22nd overall.
• Windsor had the second slowest positive population growth - two cities, Saguenay and Thunder Bay had negative population numbers.
• Windsor was 21st in employment growth - as many jobs as we have lost year over year London has lost more - they were the worst at number 25.
• Unemployment…well, you know.
• Full-time jobs as a share of employment - Windsor was 23rd.
• Bankruptcies - Windsor leads in personal bankruptcies, we’re well behind Montreal in business failure rate we’re 10th highest.
• Home sales were positive for Windsor but not by much - 13th for us.
• The value of our homes is still going down - 22nd in average sale price.
• We were positive and middle of the pack in non-residential building permits but our new home starts are still falling.

Windsor - Year Over Year

• Our Economic Activity Index score  continues its downward trend - a trend that began with the new millennium.
• Our population has increased but the rate is low, just 0.2%
• We continue to lose jobs - unemployment keeps growing.
• Of the jobs we have the proportion of full-time positions is getting smaller too.
• Consumer bankruptcies jumped (44 / 10,000 to 62 / 10,000).  Business bankruptcies increased from 2008 to 2009 but they are still fewer than in 2007.
• House sales are up in 2008 by 2.2% but housing starts continue downward.
• Non-residential building permits have increased from last year’s value by 2%.

I must say, I was surprised that our population growth was still positive however, if the number of jobs keeps falling then we will cross-over into negative growth.  None of the other numbers were much of a shock for Windsor.  The Forest City, two hours east seems to be feeling some pain too and that is worrisome.  Sure manufacturing centres are suffering but London is more diverse economically.  There are a lot of bank/insurance jobs and regional headquarter type jobs in London and those are the kind of jobs, knowledge jobs, that are supposed to carry us forward.

Next year will see St. Clair College and the University taking out some high-value building permits.  Stimulus money putting laid-off trades people and construction labourers back on payrolls and that will be good for us.  The dark side is GM will shut down and if auto sales continue to stay down around 12 million new units sold there will be more “cost-saving initiatives” coming down the pike.

The University, the College and health care services may be the biggest economic drivers for Windsor in the next economy.  Unfortunately there is still a lot of junk from the old economy we need to cast aside.  For all the end of recession cheerleading out there - the spectre of depression still looms.  Based on the slide in Economic Index scores in those CIBC reports - we may just be stepping out of the frying pan…

Tags: Auto industry, economies, London Ontario, Windsor