Wichita is hurting, no doubt about it. But look at Las Vegas, Tampa, Charlotte, Los Angeles, or, worse, Detroit.
The unemployment rate here in January was 8.6 percent, more than a percentage point below the national average and well below the nation's worst-hit cities.
If you're not in aircraft construction, you were much more likely to keep your job or find a new one. More than half of the 20,000 Wichita-area jobs lost in 2009 were concentrated in aircraft production.
The rest of the losses, 9,000 jobs, were spread over the 85 percent of the work force that doesn't do aircraft work. A few sectors, especially hospitals, even added staff.
For Kansas as a whole, unemployment was nearly 3 percentage points below the national average.
Read the complete story at kansas.com
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