Year ….. Percent of workforce jobless
2006 … 4.8
2007 … 4.5
2008 … 6.1
2009 … 10.2
2010 … 10.2
2011 … 10.1
2012 … 9.1
2013 … 8.1
2014 … 7.2
2015 … 5.8
2016… 5.1
Sources: Bureau of Labor Statistics, Georgia Department of Labor
Georgia’s unemployment rate fell to 5.1 percent in June, the state labor department said Thursday.
The economy added 11,400 jobs during the month, growing faster than the number of jobseekers in the labor force.
“We haven’t seen unemployment this low in Georgia since the beginning of the Great Recession in December 2007,” said Mark Butler, the state labor commissioner.
The state report parallels the national data which also showed very strong hiring during the month – an addition of 287,000 jobs.
It’s only one month and the data can be erratic, moreover June is one of those months in which seasonal patterns matter. The pool of unemployed is sometimes flooded by school graduates flowing into the labor force and school workers laid off for the summer.
Georgia’s data is adjusted in the hopes of accounting for those pattern. Additionally, economists often caution that one month’s information isn’t enough to draw strong conclusions, suggesting that judgment await several months of data.
But there is not much question that in Georgia, the longer term trend has been solidly positive. Over the last 12 months, Georgia has added 123,200 jobs. That is among the stronger 12-month spurts the state has had.
Here’s what is going on:
— The Georgia unemployment rate has come down from 5.8 percent in June of last year – mostly on the strength of job creation. Georgia’s rate has not been lower than national average nearly every month since the economy slipped into recession in late 2007. The national rate is 4.9 percent.
At its post-recession worst, the Georgia jobless rate was 10.5 percent. Before the recession it was under 5.0 percent.
— Despite that improvement, there are still nearly 250,000 Georgians looking for work.
— It was a better than average June for job growth. From May to June, the number of jobs in the state added 11,400 jobs to total 4,387,600. The average June during the previous three years has seen job growth of 3,400.
— Nearly all sectors added employees during the month. Leisure and hospitality added 5,300 jobs; professional and business services added 4,900, education and health services, 2,100, manufacturing, 1,700 and government, 1,300.
— Service was pretty much the only sector with job loss, dropping 3,000 jobs during the month. (Seasonal effect? Unclear.)
— Employers laid off fewer people. There were 10 percent fewer new claims for unemployment insurance in June than in May. Some of that is a seasonal trend, but it was also down 16.3 percent from a year ago.
Yet the damage of the Great Recession’s is evident: Despite population growth, the labor force is still 96,630 below its peak. The number of employed Georgians, too, is still lower than it was eight years ago.
And the number of unemployed Georgians – 249,683 – is nearly the same as when the recession started.
More troubling, the solid job growth belies a disconnect in the market: a large share of the jobless have been looking for a long time. More than 91,000 of the unemployed – 37 percent – have been seeking work for more than six months, according to the state Labor Department.
Sandra Lilly of Peachtree Corners is approaching that unhappy marker.
Laid off after 13 years with a company that made cuts after a merger, Lilly said she has sent out at least six resumes every working day since mid-February. “I am in better shape than a lot of people. I’m going to be in big trouble when the severance pay runs out.”
She has little financial cushion because she spent a big chunk of her savings on care for her dying husband. “What the 2008 crash didn’t take care of, the cancer did.”
She thinks she has gotten close to a new job, but not quite closed the deal.
Like many of the long-term unemployed, she is older – 63 – and suspects that has something to do with the hesitation of potential employers to take her on. “They can’t ask you your age, but when they ask you when you graduated high school, they have a pretty good idea.”
