The most recent comprehensive study of Pennsylvania’s surging economy was almost startling in its promise. The State of Working Pennsylvania report, released just before Labor Day, found that the state’s economic output was “significantly exceeding” pre-pandemic levels, unemployment rates were near 50-year lows, workers’ bargaining power was high, and working-class families were sharing in the prosperity in a more sustained way than at any point since 1980.
“Historically, if you told me these would be the numbers — employment, growth, stock market, inflation back down, all these things — I’d say, ‘Wow, slam dunk for the incumbent party,’” said Christopher Borick, director of the Muhlenberg College Institute of Public Opinion in Allentown. “And that’s the Democrats.”
