New Hampshire economy forges ahead; At midyear, some find it can be almost too hot.

"Plateaued" was the way Rachel Eames, a board member of the NH Association of Realtors, put it.

"A kind of a slowdown, though it did pick up a bit," said Annette Nielsen, an economist with the state Economic and Labor Market Information Bureau.

"Not an earthquake, but a bit of rumbling," summed up economist Russ Thibeault, principal of Applied Economic Research in Laconia.

But ask many businesspeople and the word "slow" doesn't come to mind.

For instance, Cirtronics, an advanced contract manufacturer in Milford, increased its workforce by 50%, to 225 people, in the last year because it has been so busy. Or GT Advanced Technologies in Hudson, which has more than doubled its workforce in three years, to 140. And Eames' Eames Realty Services of Concord had 14 offers on a house outside Bear Brook State Park in Allenstown, 48 hours after it was listed for sale.

New Hampshire is at 2.4% unemployment, the third-lowest figure in the nation in April. So what else could you want?

Some more workers perhaps, and places that they can afford to live?

And then there is the trade war. Most New Hampshire companies just hear that rumbling on the horizon, though some, like Abenaki Timber Corp. in Epsom, have already taken some shrapnel: a 25% retaliatory tariff on red oak "that has just crushed us," said Steve French, president of the firm. "We are scrambling for markets. We are scrambling to get our costs down."

Labor shortage

But overall, New Hampshire businesses are finding the economy hot, almost too hot. There's too much to do, too many orders to fill and not enough people to do it.

"The biggest problem is getting help," said Nancy Kyle, president of New Hampshire Retail Association. "It's impacting all types of businesses, not just retailers."

"We can't sell stuff because we can't find people to build," said Greg Rehm, founder and owner of Liberty Hill Construction in Bedford. "Schedules are getting blown."

The numbers, however, seem to say something different.

Business tax collections--after going up

20% in fiscal year 2018--have in the first five months of this calendar year dropped a whopping 31%.

The state's GDP? It's growing, but not so much. It grew 1.7% in the last quarter of 2018 compared to 2.2% nationwide. Ditto personal income, which lagged a half percent compared to the national rate of 4.5%.

"We had been the fastest-growing state east of the Mississippi," said Thibeault. "I sense it's a bit of a slowdown. The labor shortage has been here for a long time, and we don't have Mexican immigrants helping us out." Is it the labor shortage? New Hampshire ranks have swelled, though not by nearly enough. The civilian labor force...