DENVER (KDVR) — The new Colorado economy will take some time to get back to normal.

In the short term, Colorado’s economy is on the upswing and will stay that way for the foreseeable future.

Colorado Futures Center, a local think tank, released its quarterly ColoradoCast Tuesday. The report estimates the state’s economic outlook for the next six months.

The analysis says Colorado’s economy will grow by a 6.45% annual rate by April 2022. That growth rate is a little slower than what was forecast a few months ago. The center said supply chain problems and lingering unemployment dampen the recovery slightly.

Still, the report is good, if mixed news for the state. Federal Reserve figures say there was as much economic activity in Colorado in September 2021 as there was at the pre-pandemic economic height of February 2020, meaning the state’s economy has, in the broadest sense, fully recovered.

The center’s principal economist, Phyllis Resnick, said she hesitates to call it full economic recovery except in this macro sense. The total amount of economic spending might be similar, but it is not spread out in the economy the way it was pre-pandemic.

Certain sectors of the economy that simply haven’t bounced back and may never bounce back, along with certain demographic groups.

A report released from the University of Colorado Boulder Leeds School of Business makes the trend clear in its economic overview released Dec. 6.

The state lost 143,500 jobs since the pandemic began in 2020. Researchers forecast that jobs will grow to new heights in 2022 – 2,808,100 jobs by the end of the year.

Two out of 11 industry sections, though, will not have fully recovered to their pre-pandemic levels. Even though employment overall will go beyond pre-pandemic numbers, their will still be 8,500 fewer leisure and hospitality workers and 9,200 fewer government workers.