Throughout his campaign for governor, Rick "Let's Get Back to Work" Scott's mantra was that coming from the private sector, he knew how to create jobs.
That's huge of course, by far the #1 issue that people cared about during the campaign. Conservatives like Scott and Marco Rubio say government cannot create jobs per se, but can create the environment that allows businesses to flourish and expand.
Scott's central economic theme was centered around his"7-7-7" plan, which he says is his 7 step plan to create 700,000 jobs in 7 years time. It was derided by some of his foes (none louder than economists for Bill McCollum, one of whom called his plan "silly"), but state economists said yesterday that by natural forces, Florida will actually see a million new jobs come online over the next decade.
As the Associated Press reports:
The state now has about 7.2 million jobs, but that's expected to increase to at least 7.7 million by the 2013-14 fiscal year and to nearly 8.3 million seven years from now in 2017-18.
"Our belief is that there is nothing that has changed about Florida, its attraction to other states and other countries and that we're slowly heading back to that same pace," said Amy Baker, coordinator of the Legislature's Office of Economic and Demographic Research. "Over the long run there's still significant growth in our forecast."
