Georgia’s unemployment rate fell to 6.9 percent in December from 7.2 percent in November, as holiday hiring kicked into overdrive, the state labor department said Thursday.
“This was the first time in eight years that we’ve had job growth in December,” state labor commissioner Mark Butler said in a statement. Holiday hiring is usually done by then.
But employers added 900 jobs from November to December, bringing Georgia’s total to 4,196,400 — the highest level since the beginning of the Great Recession in December 2007.
Retail trade, warehousing and transportation, which are industries associated with holiday hiring, accounted for virtually all of the job growth, the labor department said.
Over the past year, Georgia added 108,200 jobs, which pushed down the unemployment rate from 7.4 percent in December 2013.
“We ended the year with our rate dropping below 7 percent for the first time since last April,” Butler said. “I’m especially pleased that we had very strong 2.7 percent over-the year job growth, which gave us our largest December-to-December growth since 1999.”
The key growth sectors were professional and business services, leisure and hospitality, construction, and trade and transportation.
Georgia still has a long way to go to catch up with the recovery nationally. The U.S. unemployment rate was 5.6 percent in December.
Employers here are still laying off a lot of workers, at least temporarily.
There were 57,510 new claims for unemployment insurance filed in December — an increase of 102 percent from November. Of that number, 48.5 percent were temporary claims filed mostly in textile manufacturing and construction due to seasonal layoffs. Additional temporary claims for benefits were filed in administrative and support services, and accommodations and food services.
Over the past year, however, new claims for unemployment insurance were down by 12.7 percent from December 2013. Most of that decline came in manufacturing and construction.
About the Author
