These are some of the best times on record for Portland’s economy.
Yet voters in the region feel worse about their community than they have in years.
Homelessness, income inequality and bad traffic have soured the public mood, according to a new poll commissioned by the Portland Business Alliance. The PBA issued its annual “Economic Checkup” on Wednesday.
For the first time since the Great Recession, a majority of poll respondents (55 percent) say the region is moving in the right direction. But half say the quality of life in the Portland area is getting worse.
The findings mirror, in some respects, national sentiment — in that voters acknowledge economic progress but are dissatisfied with the ways the world around them is changing.
“People are a little more optimistic about their own economic opportunities, which is good,” said Su Embree, president of DHM Research, which polled 506 voters in the Portland area for the PBA report.
However, Embree said that Portlanders won’t overlook the cost of some of those gains, as the region wrestles with how to cope with economic disruption that’s leaving a growing number of people homeless and others scrambling to find an affordable place to live.
“In Portland, a lot of if you could point to what’s going on around some of our social issues that you really can’t ignore,” she said. “Portlanders are caring people.”
First, the good news: Oregon unemployment was at its lowest point on record last year, and joblessness in the Portland area was even lower (3.6 percent at last count).
While Portland remains below the national average in per-capita income (it’s $50,489 in the Portland area, nearly $700 below the national level), wages are rising and the region has become a major draw for young, highly educated migrants who are boosting the region’s economic prospects.
The flip side, though, is that economic growth is in some ways making things worse.
There are a few reasons for that. One is that Portland’s economic gains aren’t evenly distributed. While household incomes are rising across the region, wages continue to lag for African Americans, Latinos and others. That means many people’s incomes aren’t keeping up with the rising cost of housing.
And the region has a lot of work to do on the housing front. Population growth has outpaced increases in housing stock every year since 2010, creating an accumulating deficit in regional housing. And that shortage inevitably triggers higher prices.
