The weather has been bad in much of the US the past couple of months, that depresses the job market I think. Weather is breaking, building will start up.
Our small town pop of 10,000 is in the process of getting a new Lowes, a new Wal-Greens, and another small business. It added a Perkins, a Lenny's sub shop, and a paint/flooring center last year. Just across the border in Miss they are adding 450 new jobs for a new FedX facility. Wal-mart is always very busy.
They did a feature on my hometown of 13,000 on the local news a couple months ago because it was one of the few places with a growing economy at the time. Unemployment was like 1.5 percent or something when it was 6 for the rest or the state or something like that. We are getting a Super Wal-Mart that will be opening soon and is bringing in a few jobs probably (most will just transfer from the old regular Wal-Mart). We have too many manufacturing plants to count for a small town....they are everywhere.
Our economy is just fine.