San Mateo County has lowest unemployment rate in state

The national rate last month was 5.3%, unchanged from June. The national jobless rate dropped from a peak of 10 percent almost six years ago.

There have been some announcements of job losses recently, most notably the closing of the Tyson plant in Denison, which leaves 400 people out of work.

Ten categories (construction; manufacturing; trade, transportation and utilities; information; financial activities; professional and business services; educational and health services; leisure and hospitality; other services; and government) posted job gains over the year, adding 496,500 jobs. Goods-producing industries lost 5,000 jobs in manufacturing, construction and mining and logging.

State data compares last month’s performance with job gains made in July in recent years, driven by stimulus funding and demand that built up during the downturn.

Those rates are far below the nation’s unemployment rate of 5.3 per cent and could lower the importance of the economy in those states as a political issue. The labor force is the total number of people, both employed and unemployed, over the age of 16. The over-the-year percentage decreases occurred in West Virginia (-2.5 percent) and North Dakota (-0.6 percent). Retail trade added 1,300 jobs.

Many economists use the payroll survey as their top labor market indicator, but a second survey each month calculates the unemployment rate by asking how many people are looking for a job.

A similar pattern – an increase in the unemployment rate between June and July, but lower rates than July 2014 – were reported in neighboring Madera, Merced and Tulare counties.

Nationally, the unemployment rates fell in 24 states and employers added jobs in 34 states.

Twenty-one states and the District of Columbia had statistically significant unemployment rate declines from July 2014, the largest of which occurred in Rhode Island (-1.8 percentage points) and Michigan (-1.7 points).

Education and health services with 12,300 new jobs.

The civilian labor force rose by only 1,000 across the state during the month, to 6,426,000.