Georgia’s unemployment rate rose to 7.8 percent in July from 7.4 percent in June, primarily because of seasonal layoffs in education and manufacturing, the state labor department said Thursday.
Many of the layoffs were temporary and “most of those individuals have already gone back to work,” state Labor Commissioner Mark Butler said in a statement.
Still, Georgia’s jobless rate has declined only modestly from 8.3 percent last July. And Georgia keeps falling further behind the national rate, which was 6.2 percent last month.
There were 4,098,400 jobs in Georgia in July. That was 12,800 fewer than in June, with the bulk of the loss in local government educational services, the labor department said.
The labor force decreased for the first time this year, dropping by 4,824 to total 4,777,591 in July.
There were 42,658 new claims for unemployment insurance filed in July — an increase 12.5 percent from June. Approximately one-third of the new claims were from temporary layoffs. Of the overall increase, 3,323 claims were in manufacturing.
But new applications for jobless benefits were down by 21.2 percent from July 2013.
“The positive news is that Georgia’s private sector employers created 8,200 jobs in July, with the growth coming in several industries,” Butler said. “And, the over-the-year growth continues to be strong, as we had 83,300 more jobs than in July of 2013.”
Professional and business services added 27,500 since July of last year. Leisure and hospitality gained 19,000 jobs; trade, transportation and warehousing — 18,500; manufacturing — 7,100; education and health services — 6,100; construction — 5,300; information services — 2,700; and financial services — 1,900.
Meanwhile, government lost 3,800 jobs over the past year.
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