Report: Carson lost 12.3 percent of jobs in recession

State government-dependent Carson City has lost 12.3 percent of its jobs since the start of the recession.

That's according to the Mountain Monitor, a quarterly report by Brookings Mountain West at UNLV, which also reported "as the state and local government fiscal crisis entrenches itself, government payrolls could yet decline further" in Carson City.

The report continued to show that the Intermountain West has suffered more so this recession than any other.

"For the first time in three decades the region finds itself unable to lead the nation out of a recession and forced into a period of serious questioning about the sources of future growth with further federal stimulus unlikely," according to the report.

The report also noted the Reno-Sparks area was one of two smaller metropolitan areas that experienced job growth in the first quarter, but the "gains remain minuscule compared to these metros' and the region's massive job losses since 2007." The other metro with job growth was Farmington, N.M.

Las Vegas again fared among worst among large cities in the region, according to the report.

"Three metros - Las Vegas, Phoenix, and Boise (Idaho) - stand out as the hardest hit and languish in the bottom overall quintile of performance," according to the report. "Las Vegas, in fact, reels among the 10 hardest-hit metros in the country on all four measures of recession performance."