Washington and Greene jobless rates well below U.S.
March unemployment rates for Washington and Greene counties remained below the national figure (6.7 percent) and at or below the state rate (6.0).
Seasonally adjusted figures released by the Pennsylvania Department of Labor & Industry Tuesday showed Washington County’s jobless figure was 6.0 percent, down 0.1 of a point from February, and that Greene’s was 5.6 percent – up 0.1 of a point.
Washington County was below the U.S. jobless rate for 13 of the past 14 months, the exception being this past November when both numbers were 7.0 percent. But after being under the Pennsylvania figure for at least 17 consecutive months, Washington matched the state.
Greene’s rate was under both sets of numbers for at least the past 18 months.
The March figures for both counties were 1.1 percent below those from March 2013, when Washington had 7.1 percent unemployment and Greene 6.7.
Washington is one of seven counties comprising the Pittsburgh Metropolitan Statistical Area, which had a March rate of 5.8 percent, down 0.1 percent from February and well below 7.0 percent from a year earlier. That was the sixth consecutive monthly decline for the MSA, which also includes Allegheny, Armstrong, Beaver, Butler, Fayette and Westmoreland.
Butler County had the lowest jobless rate in the MSA (5.2 percent), while Fayette (7.8) had the highest. Pittsburgh tied two other MSAs – Altoona and York-Hanover – for the fifth-lowest rate among Pennsylvania’s 14 MSAs.
Nonfarm jobs in the Pittsburgh MSA decreased by 2,400 in March to 1,155,600. For the first three months of the year, jobs were down 3,600 (0.3 percent) in the MSa and up 0.3 percent statewide.
The MSA experienced increases in three jobs categories last month: construction, by 1,800 to 47,900; retail trade, 700; and leisure and hospitality, 1,900.