Southwest Georgia unemployment rate falls in April

ALBANY — Georgia Labor Commissioner Mark Butler said Thursday that southwest Georgia’s unemployment rate and initial unemployment claims both fell in April.

Butler noted that those gains were somewhat offset by drops in the labor force and number of employed residents for the month. Even so, all indicators for the year still trend toward the positive.

“Even though we did see some fluctuations in the employment and workforce numbers across the state, job growth continues to be very strong,” Butler said.

The southwest Georgia region includes Baker, Calhoun, Colquitt, Decatur, Dougherty, Early, Grady, Lee, Miller, Mitchell, Seminole, Terrell, Thomas and Worth counties.

The Georgia Department of Labor said that, in April, the number of employed residents in the southwest Georgia region fell to 144,232. The region lost 395 employed residents for the month but remains up 1,784 over the last year. Five of Georgia’s 12 regional commissions saw an increase in employed residents. The southwest Georgia labor force ended April with 150,529 employed residents.

That number is down 1,147 over the last month but up 179 over the last year, officials said.

The jobless rate fell to 4.2 percent, a drop of .4 percent over the past month. A year ago, the jobless rate was 5.3 percent. The rates in Georgia’s 12 regions vary from a low of 3.1 percent in the Georgia Mountains to 4.7 percent in the River Valley region.

In the southwest Georgia region, initial claims for unemployment — the barometer for new layoffs — were down about 2 percent for the month and up 8 percent for the year, labor officials said.

Employ Georgia, the state Labor Department’s online job listing service at employgeorgia.com, showed 701 active job postings in the southwest Georgia region for April. The GDOL’s website at dol.georgia.gov includes information about career opportunities, Employ Georgia and other GDOL services for job seekers and employers.