A Labor Day Snapshot of Employment in Butte by George Everett Over the last year, the one-two combination of power deregulation and the divestiture of the Montana Power Company has given Butte's economy a poke in the snoot. It would be piling on by now to question the wisdom or even the sanity of a utility company that sold it's assets just before electricity prices went ballistic and then invested the profits in a telecommunications venture just as the value of companies in that industry slipped into a near death spiral. Among others, The Wall Street Journal has already done that and there's no need to flog a dead horse.
Life goes on.
Despite economic shiners that have left some noses out of joint and bruised a few new ventures, Butte is still working. With a population of 34,406, according to the numbers from the 2000 census, it's not too difficult to identify where most of us are working, either. With the pending break up and sale of Montana Power's assets announced last March, Montana Power's staff dropped from 934, but they are still the major private employer in Butte. Northwestern Energy Corporation of South Dakota is in the process of buying the electric utility and they have chosen to keep the name Montana Power Company . Meanwhile, Touch America is the spinoff telecommunications company that capital from that sale has gone to develop.