Data/Methods: Using data from 1991 to the onset of the Marcellus Shale boom (2008:12) we test for cointegration between county employment in Pennsylvania (PA) and PA and U.S. overall economic activity for each of the sixty-seven PA counties. County-level employment data was obtained from the Bureau of Labor Statistics and PA and U.S. economic activity was measured with the Philadelphia Federal Reserve coincident indies. We subsequently estimate error correction models for each county and use them to generate county employment forecasts from 2009:01-2016:09. Actual county employment is then compared to its forecast to ascertain whether or not shale drilling led to employment levels that were significantly higher or lower than what would have been expected. To further address this line of inquiry, the deviation of actual county employment from forecast is regressed against county-specific variables, including the county's industry makeup just before the Great Recession, a dummy-variable indicating whether or not the county is urban or rural, and the number of wells drilled per capita during the shale boom, to determine what role, if any, Marcellus Shale drilling had in influencing the deviation of county employment from forecast.
Results: Results to date reveal that PA counties generally underperformed relative to employment forecasts, but that all else equal, having more shale drilling did tend to have a slightly positive employment effect that is significant at the 10% level.