Sacramento’s regional economy is slowing in the face of several daunting factors, including declines in goods-producing employment, fewer construction jobs and a fast-aging workforce. That’s the conclusion of the Sacramento Business Review, considered to be a comprehensive, precise, and intellectually sophisticated analysis of the regional economy.

The only publication that features in-depth focus on the regional economy, the Sacramento Business Review is published twice yearly in partnership between Sacramento State’s College of Business Administration and the Chartered Financial Analyst Society (CFA) of Sacramento. Professor Sanjay Varshney of Sacramento State’s College of Business Administration serves as chief economist on the panel of experts that produces the Review.

The full report of the Review’s 18th edition was released over the summer. Its findings reveal a local economy that contrasts with the national economic landscape, which continues to improve. The Review’s panel expects that, in addition to a slower labor market and the construction sector losing jobs for the first time in seven years, loan growth among banks and credit unions will slow because of tightening credit conditions that affect local commercial real estate and deteriorations in the auto loan segment.

Sacramento also has the nation’s fourth fastest-aging workforce, which is cause for concern among area employers.

“The region desperately needs to do something about developing or attracting higher-paid jobs and diversifying the job mix,” Varshney says.

Copies of the Review can be downloaded free at sacbusinessreview.com. – Ahmed V. Ortiz