palm tree imageYes, you read that headline correctly.

The same day the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics announces that the Detroit metro area continues to lead the nation in ugly unemployment figures, Delta Airlines announces that direct flights to Honolulu are set to begin this summer.

Let no one doubt the power of economic cross-currents flowing past dizzying contradictions. Or at least, flying past them.

Yesterday, the U.S. Labor Department’s Bureau of Labor Statistics released its Metropolitan Area Employment and Unemployment Summary for the the month of October.

According to the report, the Motor City and its environs are obviously still hurting more than anyone else:

Of the 49 metropolitan areas with a Census 2000 population of 1 million  or more, Detroit-Warren-Livonia, Mich., reported the highest unemployment rate in October, 16.7 percent.

(But leave it to MLive Detroit blogger/producer Jonathan Oosting to tease out the good news here: “Silver-linings are hard to come buy in Detroit job data, but here’s the best we can do: The jobless rate fell .6 percent from September, when it reached 17.3 percent,” he wrote in a post.)

Within Detroit’s city limits, reported unemployment is nearly 30 percent.

Meanwhile, the Associated Press reports that Delta Airlines Inc. somehow picked the very same day to announce that in June it will be resuming the Detroit-Honolulu service cut back in 2004.

From the story:

The company said it was able to add the routes because its combination with Northwest gives it enough passengers… to make the flights viable. Northwest has long maintained a hub in Detroit.

Adding seasonal insult to real injury, Detroiters need those Hawaii get-a-ways now — as the year’s first snow storms are probably only days away — not in June when the weather in Detroit will likely be pretty nice.