ORLANDO, Dec. 18, 2024 — While hurricanes Helene and Milton felt like “huge lumps of coal” to parts of the state impacted, Florida’s overall economy is still on “Santa’s nice list” this year—and should stay that way through 2027—says University of Central Florida economist Sean Snaith.
In his holiday-themed forecast out this morning, Snaith released his last formal predictions of the year with a quarterly economic forecast for Florida that offers a rosy-cheeked outlook for the Sunshine State, where economic performance continues to outpace the national average.
“Florida’s labor market is a sugar plum, and population growth continues to be the gift that keeps on giving in Florida,” said Snaith, the director of UCF’s Institute for Economic Forecasting.
Snaith adds: “Even with uncertainty about fiscal policy post-election and the increasing likelihood of the Fed pausing its interest rate cuts notwithstanding, Florida’s economy remains in a very strong position as 2024 ends.”
Additional highlights from Snaith’s four-year forecast include:
• From 2024-27, Florida’s economy, as measured by Real Gross State Product, will expand at an average annual rate of 2.8%. Real Gross State Product will decelerate during the economic slowdown as growth will slow to 3.6% in 2024 and 3.1% in 2025, then further to 2.7% in 2026 and 1.9% in 2027.
• Florida’s unemployment rate fell to 2.9% in 2023. The slowing U.S. economy will push the rate up to 3.3% in 2024, and to 3.6% in 2025 and rise to 4.0% by 2027—all the while remaining below the forecast for the U.S. economy.
• Labor force growth in Florida will average 1.0% from 2024-27. After growing 3.6% in 2022, Florida’s labor force growth fell to 2.8% in 2023, and with slower economic growth, labor force growth will average 1.1% during 2025-27.
• The sectors expected to have the strongest average job growth during 2024-27 are Construction (2.7%), Federal Government (1.9%), Education & Health Services (1.7%), Leisure & Hospitality (1.6%), and State & Local Government (1.2%).
• Payroll job growth in Florida will begin to gradually decelerate as the economy remains essentially at full employment. After year-over-year growth of 5.7% in 2022, payroll employment growth in 2023 was 3.3% but will slow to 2.2% in 2024 and drift lower to 0.2% by 2027, all the while outperforming the national labor market.
• Housing starts have felt headwinds from higher mortgage rates. Total starts were 193,700 in 2022—before higher mortgage rates and a slowing economy started a deceleration that will slow starts to 164,924 in 2025. From this point, starts will drift higher to 171,450 in 2027.
• Real personal income growth will average 3.7% during 2024-27. Following an inflation-driven contraction in 2022, growth will be 3.4% in 2027. Florida’s average growth will be 0.8 percentage points higher than the national rate during 2024-27.
Sean Snaith, Ph.D., is the director of UCF’s Institute for Economic Forecasting and a nationally recognized economist in the field of economics, forecasting, analysis and market sizing. He has been recognized by Bloomberg News as one of the country’s most accurate economic forecasters and has served as a consultant for both local governments and multi-national corporations. Before joining UCF’s College of Business, Snaith held faculty positions at Pennsylvania State University, American University in Cairo, the University of North Dakota and the University of the Pacific. More of Snaith’s work is available here or you can follow him @SeanSnaith.
