Area unemployment rates fall in December
More people found work in December, helping to slightly drive down jobless rates in Fayette County and other areas. Fayette County’s seasonally adjusted unemployment rate fell from 6.5 percent in November to 6.4 percent in December. Fayette’s rate in December 2005 was 6.6 percent. Greene County’s unemployment rates were 5.9 percent in November, 5.8 percent in December and 6 percent in December 2005.
Washington County’s jobless rate rose slightly from 4.8 percent to 4.9 percent from November to December. Its December 2005 rate was 5.3 percent.
In rankings among Pennsylvania’s 67 counties, Fayette County’s jobless rate placed it at 65th highest; Greene ranked 62nd; and Washington County was 30th. The highest unemployment rate during December was 7.4 percent in Forest County and the lowest was 3.4 percent in Adams County.
Michele Hiester, an industry and business analyst for the Pennsylvania Department of Labor Center for Workforce Information and Analysis, reported the growing labor force, increase in employment and “shrinking unemployment rolls pointed to an improving regional economy.’
Hiester said that from December 2005 to December 2006, total nonfarm jobs in the PMSA were up 5,700, making December the 18th consecutive month jobs were above the year-ago level.
Significant job additions came, she said, in education and health services, leisure and hospitality, and government and outweighed over-the-year reductions in manufacturing. Hiester said the seasonally adjusted jobless rate in the seven-county Pittsburgh Metropolitan Statistical Area (PMSA) inched up to 4.7 percent in December, making this the fourth consecutive month the unemployment rate was below 5 percent. The seasonally adjusted rate takes into account normal shifts in employment, such as declines in construction during bad weather and gains in entertainment during good weather. Counties in the PMSA are Fayette, Washington, Westmoreland, Beaver, Butler, Armstrong and Allegheny.
“The seasonally adjusted resident employment estimate was down over the month while unemployment edged up, pushing the unemployment rate up .1 percent. Pittsburgh’s rate ranked 10th lowest out of Pennsylvania’s 14 MSAs and was the only MSA to show an over-the-month rise in the unemployment rate. PMSA’s unemployment rate receded .2 percent from the December 2005 rate of 4.9 percent,’ Hiester said in her monthly labor report.
In specific areas of the PMSA, Hiester said payrolls were down .4 percent from November to December. “Reductions in construction, natural resources and mining were responsible for the bulk of this decline,’ she said.
Construction also continued its seasonal slide and cut 3,800 jobs. This over-the-month decline was in line with recent November-to-December declines, Hiester said.
Retailers hired additional workers to cover increases in shopping during the holidays, adding 2,200 more jobs in December in the PMSA. Hiester said that food and beverage stores, clothing stores and department stores all contributed to December’s increase.
However, employment was down by 900 jobs in the PMSA in professional and business services, with reductions mostly in the administrative and support services subsector. Hiester said this was also in line with the average November-to-December loss. Another normal shift came as colleges, universities and local public schools reduced payrolls as students went on holiday break.