Unemployment rates stay mostly steady

Texas’ unemployment rate rose to 4.4 percent in October from 4.2 percent in September, the second consecutive month-over-month rise, according to data released Friday by the Texas Workforce Commission. It sits just above the national average of 5 percent. The annual employment growth rate is strong, he said.

“That’s very, very healthy”, Deck said. “We haven’t seen the labor force this large since 2009 and 2010”.

The state’s unemployment rate still has room to fall, Deck said.

Statewide unemployment dipped to 5.8 percent in October from 5.9 percent in September.

Noonan said employers in a wide range of fields are reporting difficulty in recruiting workers.

Almost 1.3 million Arkansans were employed and 68,500 were unemployed in October. As retailers gear up for a big holiday season, Tennesse’s unemployment rate fell to a seven year low. That was the worst showing of any of the state’s labor markets and was in stark contrast to Fairfield County, which added 1,400 jobs. “That’s actually speeding up from where it was last month, so that’s good news”.

A hiring rebound in October added 271,000 jobs, the most this year. “The fact that we teach critical-thinking and require students to take a broad spectrum of courses-that they’re pretty sure they’ll never need-is our way of saying you don’t know what you’re going to be doing ten years from now”.

“So we’re adding jobs at a moderate pace”, he said. “But commercial construction permits are down for 2015 year to date”.

The job loss was the fourth monthly decline this year. “But that seems to have tapered off again”. The public sector recorded a gain of 900 jobs.

The drop was fueled largely by NY City, which saw its unemployment rate drop from 5.2 percent in September to 4.8 percent last month. The largest over-the-month percentage increase in employment occurred in Idaho (+1.1 percent), followed by Alaska (+0.9 percent) and Wyoming (+0.8 percent). In total, 20 states had unemployment rates significantly lower than the US figure of 5.0 percent, 12 states and the District of Columbia had measurably higher rates, and 18 states had rates that were not appreciably different from that of the nation.