Metro Atlanta’s jobless rate last month slid under 6 percent for the first time since mid-2008, when the economy was falling deeper into recession.
The decline in the rate to 5.9 percent in March – down from 6.1 percent in February – came as the region added 1,900 jobs during the month and the number of unemployed people dropped by 4,867, the state Labor Department reported Thursday.
Returning to a sub-6 percent rate is a milestone in the region’s uneven recovery. If the trend continues, the rate could soon be half its painful peak of 10.6 percent in 2011.
However, the March rate is still higher than any number since the early 1990s.
The larger trend is positive, said Mark Butler, state labor commissioner. He noted that the region added 80,000 jobs in the past year for a 3.3 percent growth rate, better than the national average.
Among those landing work: Jen Anderson, 32, of Atlanta, who was working when she got a call in January from a Buckhead company looking for someone to direct communications and public relations.
“I came in for a couple of interviews and was hired a few weeks later,” she said.
The metro’s unemployment rate, which is not adjusted to account for seasonal patterns, typically dips in March.
Still, more than 165,000 people in metro Atlanta are officially unemployed – a figure that does not include people who have gone back to school, retired early, gone on disability or simply given up looking.
It also doesn’t include those who are under-employed, such as Cindy Stewart, 50, of Lilburn, who has a $10-an-hour job at a retail chain but can’t get the company to let her work enough hours to make a living.
“It has become critical for me to find something better,” she said. “I want a full-time job.”
A few years ago, Stewart went back to school and is now close to getting a bachelor’s degree. Meanwhile, she does the rounds at job fairs and scours the Internet, looking mostly for clerical or administrative jobs.
“You’re faceless online,” she said. “Getting an interview is rare.”
Some people stitch together part-time jobs. That is why metro Atlanta has more jobs than it did at its 2008 peak, but fewer people employed.
Fran Whitfield of Canton, for example, has had a part-time job and sought more work. She recently got a call from a Marietta company that offered to hire her to do accounting work the rest of the week.
“It’s pretty amazing,” she said. “I really need this. I am hoping it can be full-time.”
While steady, job growth has been modest.
Business investment and expansion has been weaker than it should be, said Rajeev Dhawan, director of the Economic Forecasting Center at Georgia State University. That is part of a vicious circle: Banks, investors and corporations are not spending enough to speed up the economy, partly because growth is too slow to provide the returns they want.
Lenders also recall how badly they were burned during the recession, he said. “The issues are a lack of productive opportunities and a lack of appetite for risk.”
Among the core counties of metro Atlanta, the lowest jobless rates are in Cobb and Gwinnett counties – both at 5.3 percent. The state’s lowest belongs to Oconee County near Athens, at 4.3 percent.
Only a few counties are still in double digits. The highest rate is in Clay County in southwest Georgia: 11.9 percent, according to the Labor Department.
Atlanta remains the state’s economic engine, with 60 percent of Georgia’s jobs.
A series of corporate relocations – led by the likes of Mercedes’ U.S. division – underscore the region’s promise of continued expansion, Dhawan said.
“It’s not a boom. But there’s a nice buzz about Atlanta right now.”
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