Florida’s Halftime Report & Presidential Deja 'Vu – Top 3 Takeaways – August 28th, 2024
- Florida’s Halftime Report. Ok, so technically we’re now two-thirds of the way through the year as we’re heading down the homestretch of August (and only 69 days away from Election Day). However, in the data driven world, results trail dates and it's in that vein that yesterday the Florida Chamber of Commerce released their 2024 Business & Economic Mid-Year Report. And the report was full of interesting news about what happened during the first half of this year in the free state of Florida. And the news, as we’ve been accustomed to, continued to be good. As summed up by the Chamber “Florida continues to see an influx of wealth, job creation, and a growing economy”. And the data behind that statement shows Florida continues to outperform the national economy in every category. Florida’s economy grew at a rate that more than doubled the national economy to start the year and that growth continued to be powered by net migration yet again. Florida’s population isn’t growing at the post-pandemic peak over a thousand new Floridians per day, but we’re not far from it with the state still gaining 750 net new residents per day – a number that’s easily the best in the country. And as people are moving, they’re taking their wealth with them. Florida was also in the top spot for net wealth migration to start the year with $36.1 billion of new net wealth brought into the state by those who moved into the state compared to the wealth that was lost from those moving out of it. And which region of the state benefitted most by the massive wealth migration? South Florida. Miami-Dade was the #3 county for net wealth migration, Collier County was #2 and the biggest migration winner of all to start 2024 was...Palm Beach County with $4.5 billion gained in migrated wealth. And where is Florida gaining the most wealth from? You guessed it...the usual high tax blue states. New York is #1, New Jersey #2, California #3, Illinois #4 and Pennsylvania #5.
- Florida’s job growth is continuing to power the economy too. At 1.4% to start the year – the rate of job growth wasn’t great – but it was better than the national average with Florida accounting for over 9% of all new jobs added – a pace that’s well ahead of the 6.6% of the country’s working population that Florida currently accounts for. And continued diversification of Florida’s economy continues to be key as our state is now 4th in the country for tech jobs (and growing) and 14th for R&D (and climbing). Speaking of climbing, something else that is that’s important to greater stability and affordability is as well. Housing inventory. The Chamber’s report notes there’s been a 60% increase in single family home inventory year-over-year – bringing housing inventory levels back in line with where they were prior to the pandemic. Increased housing inventory combined with lower mortgages rates in the back half of the year and with a recovery that’s underway in Florida’s property insurance industry have the potential to significantly address many of the long-standing affordability challenges for many families across the state. On that note, the Chamber notes that rent rates fell across the entire state during the first half of the year. The range in rent rates was a decrease of 0.3% in the Miami-Fort-Lauderdale metro, to a decrease of greater than 11% in Punta Gorda. The bottom line is that Florida’s economic story continued to be the best story of any state in the country through the first half of the year (with South Florida’s story being the best story within the state) and that will be especially important should the US economy begin to have its challenges as we head down the homestretch of this year as much of the recent economic data that’s come out has suggested.
- A single swing state. There’s an old expression in sales that’s just about as relevant today as it’s ever been. People buy from people they like. This is true in corporate sales. This is true in grocery sales (as in you buy from your grocery store(s) of choice). Much of the recent hype would make you think most of the country has suddenly changed their tune when it comes to Kamala’s campaign. Following a week of free vasectomies and abortions outside of the Democrat’s convention – because ya know – Vance and Trump are really the weird ones – and alleged good vibes free from any type of meaningful policy speeches on the inside, most news media outlets and some of the recent polls might have you thinking most Americans really have started picking up the vibes that Kamala’s campaign is putting down. But it’s not true. It’s early in the post-convention polling that’s begun to emerge but here’s a theme. Kamala Harris is running better nationally than in swing states across the country – in literally every single poll. What’s more is that Kamala’s favorability rating since becoming the Democrat’s nominee has surged...but only among Democrats. And that takes me to the point of the third takeaway today. When you break it down state-by-state Kamala Harris only has a positive favorability rating in 17 states...and only one of those, Wisconsin (where she has a net positive 1% rating), is a swing state. Kamala has surged to double-digit rates of favorability in large blue states like California and New York, that’s making what’s happening in other states look better (she has a net negative 11-point rating in Florida). By comparison Trump’s not exactly performing better, but he does have positive favorability in 19 states currently (no swing states) – and that doesn’t include Florida where he currently has a net negative 1% favorability rating. The closer we’re getting to this election, the more it’s taking on the shape of 2016. Two candidates with low favorability outside of their bases across the country. One’s a woman who was a former left-wing blue state senator who’s spent considerable time in close proximity to the presidency. One’s Donald Trump. In a race in which the average voter isn’t thrilled about buying what either candidate is selling...the question comes back down to policy. Sometimes people buy from people they don’t like because they’ve got the best product. If this race continues down this path it’s likely to turn on policy. If turns on policy Trump wins. He’s got the better product as he wins on the most important issues to voters in the polls.