Alabama’s July Unemployment Rate is 7.0%

MONTGOMERY – Governor Robert Bentley on Friday announced Alabama’s preliminary, seasonally adjusted July unemployment rate is 7.0%.

Wage and salary employment increased by 19,400 over the year.  Yearly gains were seen in the leisure and hospitality sector (+7,800), the manufacturing sector (+5,700), the education and health services sector (+5,000), and the professional and business services sector (+3,300). Over the month, wage and salary employment gains were seen in the construction sector (+2,600), the leisure and hospitality sector (+1,500), the trade, transportation, and utilities sector (+1,400), and the manufacturing sector (+1,200), among others.

“An increase of nearly 20,000 jobs since last July is something that we are proud of,” Governor Robert Bentley said. “A large number of those jobs are the manufacturing sector, which tend to be higher paying jobs. Additionally, we continue to see tens of thousands of jobs being advertised throughout the state, which means employers are hiring. Our efforts will continue until every Alabamian who wants a job has the opportunity to have a job.”

JobLink, the state’s online free jobs database (www.joblink.alabama.gov), registered more than 20,000 job postings in July. The Help Wanted Online (HWOL) data showed 53,321 total job ads were placed online in Alabama.  The most advertised careers are: truck drivers, retail supervisors, and registered nurses.

“It is not uncommon in the summer months to see the unemployment rate rise because school employees aren’t working during these months,” Alabama Department of Labor Commissioner Fitzgerald Washington said. “This is proven out in our wage and salary data this month, which shows the largest decrease in jobs came from the local education sector.”

Counties with the lowest unemployment rates are: Shelby County at 5.3%, Baldwin County at 6.1%, and Lee County at 6.2%.  Counties with the highest unemployment rates are: Wilcox County at 18.4%, Dallas County at 16.3%, and Perry County at 15.7%.

Unemployment Rate by County, July 2014

July 2014 Map

“Seasonal adjustment” refers to BLS’s practice of anticipating certain trends in the labor force, such as hiring during the holidays or the surge in the labor force when students graduate in the spring, and removing their effects to the civilian labor force. The Current Population (CPS), or the household survey, is conducted by the Census Bureau and identifies members of the work force and measures how many people are working or looking for work. The establishment survey, which is conducted by the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), a division of the U.S. Department of Labor, surveys employers to measure how many jobs are in the economy.  This is also referred to as wage and salary employment.