State unemployment remains flat
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April 19, 2013 |
Idaho’s seasonally adjusted unemployment rate
held steady in March at 6.2 percent, the result
of the continuing decline in the labor force and
caution on the part of the state’s employers.
Another 1,400 people left Idaho’s labor force in
March, the largest one-month exodus since the
heart of the recession three years ago and the
third straight monthly decline.
Over 2,600 people have dropped out of Idaho’s
labor force since December 2012, leaving it at
just over 772,000 and erasing any gains made
since January 2012 when the economy was
struggling to begin its recovery.
Idaho employers hired 13,000 workers in March
for both new and replacement jobs - about 500
fewer than they hired in March 2012 and well
below prerecession hiring levels. While March’s
job creation was about twice the average during
the past five years, it was below normal
economic times, much less a robust recovery.
As a result, total employment fell for the
second month in a row, dropping more than 600 to
724,500.
Government jobs continued contracting, albeit
modestly during March.
Government has been shedding jobs in the
recession’s aftermath as tax revenues tighten.
Modest job growth beyond normal in the
much-smaller manufacturing sector partially
offset the reluctance of private sector
employers to hire on the service side of the
economy, which has been producing three of every
four new jobs since the recovery began.
The activity in goods production was a welcome
sign for Idaho since those jobs average $10,000
a year more in pay than service sector jobs.
Overall, the first third of 2013 was stronger
than 2012. About 8,000 more people were working
in March than in March 2012, and the number of
unemployed at 47,500 was 9,500 lower.
Nationally, unemployment dropped another tenth
of a point in March to 7.6 percent while Idaho’s
rate, unchanged from February, remained below
the national rate for the 138th month – 11½
years. Last March, Idaho’s unemployment rate was
7.4 percent after peaking at 8.8 percent in late
2010.
Unemployment benefits were also falling with the
jobless rate.
Regular unemployment insurance benefits totaling
$15.8 million were paid to an average of 16,000
idled workers in March, down 21 percent from
March 2012’s $19.9 million paid to over 20,000
people.
Another 5,500 workers a week received a total of
nearly $5.4 million during the month in federal
extended benefits, about half the number and
payout of a year earlier. The extended benefit
program formally ends in December, and federal
budget cutting has curtailed those benefits this
spring.
The combination of employed workers and those
actively seeking work falling to just 772,000
underscored analyst concerns about the state’s
ability to sustain a strong recovery.
While Idaho’s economy has been generating jobs
faster than the national economy, its labor
force remains at a 2011 level when job creation
was minimal.
Only three of the state’s 44 counties posted
double-digit unemployment rates in March –
Shoshone, Benewah and Clearwater – down from
four counties in February and seven a year
earlier. Fifteen counties had slightly higher
rates than in February while 29 had lower rates.
Only Custer County, hit by a layoff at the
molybdenum mine, had a higher rate at 7.1
percent than in March 2012.
In Boundary County, 392 people were seeking jobs
in March, for an unemployment rate of 8.4
percent, down slightly from February's 8.6
percent and considerably better than March 2012,
when the unemployment rate stood at 10.3
percent.
Clearwater County had the state’s highest rate
at 12.5 percent, seven-tenths higher than
February due mostly to spring conditions keeping
loggers out of the woods. Camas County had the
lowest rate at 3.7 percent. Twenty-four counties
had rates under 6 percent. |
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