Economists at the University of Virginia predict unemployment will rise this year to 4.4%. Joao Ferreira, acting director of the Center for Economic and Policy Studies, says job growth is already down.
“Consulting, technical and professional services we started seeing a decline, and last year Virginia closed the year mostly with stagnation and not with the creating of jobs.”
In the fourth quarter of 2025, only three sectors saw strong growth: construction, linked to data centers, transportation and healthcare. The latter, he says, could take a dive due to cuts in federal programs like Medicaid…