State Unemployment (Seasonally Adjusted)
In January, the lowest state unemployment rates were in Hawaii, 3.0 per- cent, and North Dakota and Virginia, 3.3 percent each. The states with the highest jobless rates were Alaska, 7.4 percent; Michigan and Mississippi, 7.1 percent each; and South Carolina, 7.0 percent. The District of Columbia recorded a jobless rate of 8.2 percent. Three states registered the lowest rates in their revised series in January--Idaho and Montana, 4.3 percent each, and West Virginia, 4.7 percent. (All state series begin in 1976.) In January, 19 states had unemployment rates that were below the U.S. rate, 8 states and the District of Columbia reported higher rates, and 23 states had rates that were little different from that of the nation.Nine states and the District of Columbia reported over-the-month jobless rate decreases. The largest declines were in New York, Oregon, and Pennsylvania (-0.6 percentage point each) and Colorado and Maine (-0.5 point each). The District of Columbia also posted a rate decline (-0.6 percentage point) over the month. Tennessee was the only state to record an over-the- month rate increase (+0.6 percentage point). Forty states reported January unemployment rates that were little different from those of December.
The states with the largest over-the-year declines in their jobless rates were New Jersey and Oregon (-1.5 percentage points each), Washington (-1.4 points), New York (-1.3 points), and Arizona (-1.2 points). Rhode Island was the only other state to register an unemployment rate decline of at least 1.0 percentage point from January 2004. Mississippi experienced the largest unemployment rate increase from a year earlier (+1.5 percentage points). The District of Columbia's jobless rate rose by the next largest amount (+0.7 per- centage point).
Nonfarm Payroll Employment (Seasonally Adjusted)
From December to January, total nonfarm employment rose in 29 states and the District of Columbia and decreased in 21 states. The largest employment gains were reported in Florida (+38,800), Texas (+21,900), California (+20,000), and Indiana (+15,300). Alaska posted the largest over-the-month percentage increase in employment (+1.3 percent), followed by Louisiana and West Virginia (+0.6 percent each), Florida, Indiana, and Wyoming (+0.5 percent each), and Arizona, Mississippi, and Nebraska (+0.4 percent each). The largest employ- ment decreases occurred in Kansas (-12,600), Georgia (-11,800), New York (-10,000), Missouri (-8,500), and Ohio (-8,200). The largest over-the-month percentage employment losses were reported in Kansas and Montana (-0.9 percent each), followed by Hawaii (-0.7 percent), Vermont (-0.4 percent), and Georgia and Missouri (-0.3 percent each).Over the year, employment rose in 49 states and the District of Columbia and decreased in 1 state, Michigan. Florida recorded the largest over-the- year gain in employment (+261,300), followed by California (+235,800), Texas (+137,700), Virginia (+90,800), and Arizona (+90,700). States reporting over- the-year employment increases of 2.0 percent or higher were largely concentra- ted in the Mountain and Pacific geographic divisions. The largest percentage gains were reported in Nevada (+6.3 percent), Arizona (+3.9 percent), Oregon (+3.7 percent), Florida (+3.5 percent), and Montana (+3.2 percent). Michigan recorded the only decline in employment over the year (-15,200 or -0.3 percent).
