Because of the federal government shutdown, the most closely-watched monthly job numbers for Georgia will not be released this week.
The unemployment rate for September and the number of new jobs added, figures typically released on the third Thursday of each month, will not be coming, said Sam Hall, Labor Department spokesman.
Those two numbers are the yin and yang of the labor market: the jobless rate shows how many people are seeking work, the job growth number shows the number of jobs created. No state will have that information during the shutdown.
“The computation of that data is a joint effort” between state and federal officials, Hall said.
However, the number of new claims for unemployment benefits will be released. Those claims are filed directly with the state Labor Department.
After steadily adding jobs for about three years, the economy shed jobs for much of this calendar year. August’s job totals were only about 8,000 higher than August of 2012.
The state’s unemployment rate in August was 8.7 percent, down from 8.8 percent in July and 9.0 percent in August of 2012.
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