Jacksonville’s unemployment rate fell in April to a level not seen in more than a decade, before the last recession.
The jobless rate in the Jacksonville metropolitan area, comprising Duval, Baker, Clay, Nassau and St. Johns counties, dropped from 3.5 percent in March to 3.2 percent in April, the Florida Department of Economic Opportunity said last week.
That’s the lowest unemployment rate for Northeast Florida since the spring of 2006, when it dropped to 2.9 percent.
Duval County’s unemployment rate fell from 3.6 percent in March to 3.3 percent last month and St. Johns County dropped from 3 percent to 2.7 percent, tying it with Okaloosa County in the Panhandle for the lowest in the state.
Florida’s statewide unemployment rate was unchanged at a seasonally adjusted 3.9 percent in April, the Department of Economic Opportunity said.
The state agency does not provide seasonally adjusted data for individual counties and metropolitan areas.
However, the University of North Florida’s Local Economic Indicators Project reported when the data is seasonally adjusted, it still shows a significant drop in the metro area’s jobless rate from 3.59 percent in March to 3.24 percent in April.
Duval County’s seasonally adjusted unemployment rate fell from 3.73 percent in March to 3.44 percent in April, it said.
“The local labor market performance has been outstanding so far in 2018,” UNF economist Albert Loh said.
Jacksonville nonfarm businesses added 17,300 jobs from April 2017 through April 2018, a 2.5 percent growth rate, the agency said.
That was better than Florida’s statewide growth rate of 2.1 percent.
Job gains were led by 7 percent growth in the administrative and support and waste services sector and a 6.4 percent gain in construction jobs.
The only major sectors to lose jobs were wholesale trade, down 2 percent, and the information sector, down 1.1 percent.
