Northeast Georgia Unemployment Declines

National unemployment rates in November fell from 9.0% to 8.6%, according to Bureau of Labor Statistics Commissioner Keith Hall.  There are currently 13.3 million unemployed persons in the nation, down from nearly 13.9 million in October. 

Northeast Georgia, at 8.9%, had a lower average than Georgia’s overall unemployment rate, which was 9.3%.  Oconee County has the lowest average, at 5.9%, while Barrow is nearly on par with the nation at 8.7%. 

Last November, the jobless rate in the area was 9.8%. 

Meanwhile, Georgia’s seasonally adjusted unemployment rate had its largest one-month decline since 1977, falling to 9.9 percent from 10.2 percent in October. The jobless rate was 10.4 percent in November a year ago, according to the Georgia Department of Labor. 

The change was due to an additional 22,400 jobs.  Growth came in the retail trade, financial and business services and education and health care. 

An alternative measure of unemployment includes people who are marginally attached – those who have been unemployed for over a year but have not actively pursued work in the past four weeks – plus those employed part-time for economic reasons.  That number, as of October, was nationally 16.2%.  In October 2011, Georgia’s average was 17.6%. 

Before the recession of 2008, that number hovered around 8%.