Texas is still going through a mild recession but things will change in 2017.
That’s what Comerica ‘s economic outlook found. The bank tracks the economies in five states.
Greater Houston has a big role to play in this. It accounts for a quarter of all jobs in the state.
The banks's chief economist, Robert Dye, expects job growth in Houston to continue to be weak for the remainder of 2016. But he said the economy should be on a path to improvement by next year.
"We know that drilling activity is coming back up from the floor here in Texas," he said. "We know that the global economy is doing OK, North America doing OK, Europe, China still growing. We expect demand to increase."
Dye said a lot of the Texas economy still depends on how the oil industry is doing, but fortunately not as much as it used to, "and non-energy businesses are going to be very, very important in mitigating the downdraft here as we go through this energy-sector reset."
He said the healthcare industry and education, for example, are doing well in Texas.
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