General Discussion

The impact of [Operation Metro Surge] was unimaginable. Renee Good and Alex Pretti shot and killed, and over 3,700 people—disproportionately people of color—were taken into custody, regardless of whether they had criminal histories.

Meanwhile, local businesses suffered. Many businesses lost significant sums of money and some were forced to close. While the full effect of OMS likely won’t be felt by Minnesotans for years to come, we do have a good idea of how OMS affected the state’s employment numbers.

Aaron Rosenthal, the executive director of North Star Policy Action, an independent research institute in Minnesota, estimates that the Minneapolis-St. Paul metro area lost at least $106 million in wages in January. The City of Minneapolis estimated a loss of $47 million in wages just for its residents and Nguyen notes that the Twin Cities’ job growth rate fell behind the growth rate of the rest of the state, which is also incredibly unusual since the metro area typically drives so much economic activity.

And even those residents who kept working amid the OMS surge were often working fewer hours, Rosenthal notes. In January, for example, the average private-sector worker logged 31.1 hours of work a week, which was the lowest number since 2007. “People who didn’t lose jobs, but who kept jobs and just worked fewer hours or didn’t show up at all,” Rosenthal says.