Unemployment in Tennessee fell last month to an all-time low as employers across the state added a net 53,000 jobs over the past 12 months.
The Tennessee Department of Labor and Workforce Development said Thursday that the statewide jobless rate fell during February by four tenths of a percentage point to 3.2 percent. Tennessee reached its previous record low unemployment rate of 3.3 percent in October 2018 and remained at that level for four consecutive months.
The rate last month was the lowest since the state began tracking unemployment rates in 1976 and was well below last month's 3.8 percent jobless rate for the United States as a whole.
A sign leads job seekers to a job fair put on by EPIC Talent Solutions Wednesday, August 22, 2018 at the Chattanooga Times Free Press in Chattanooga, Tennessee. The next job fair will be held October 24."To reach a record low unemployment rate is quite a milestone for Tennessee," Tennessee Labor Commissioner Jeff McCord said in releasing the February report. "Month after month the state has experienced record low, or near record low unemployment for nearly two years."
While Tennessee did see record-breaking unemployment in February, there was still a 1,500-person decrease in the number of jobs across the state. The unemployment rate fell because of a bigger drop in the number of persons actively looking for work during the month.
Over the past 12 months, however, employment grew by 1.7 percent, or 53,000 jobs. A separate household survey showed the number of persons with jobs was up by 1.8 percent in the past year in Tennessee, or more than 50 percent greater than the 1.1 percent growth in working Americans overall in the past year.
Despite the job gains, however, average pay for manufacturing workers in Tennessee slipped by 13 cents an hour last month to $19.78 an hour, or 9.7 percent less than the U.S. average of $21.89 per hour, according to state figures released Thursday.
While unemployment fell to an historic low last month in Tennessee, the jobless rate edged higher in neighboring Georgia where unemployment in February rose by a tenth of a percentage point to 3.9 percent.
Although still below the 4.2 percent rate of a year ago in February 2018, Georgia's unemployment rate has risen in each of the first two months of 2019 and is now slightly above the U.S. rate of 3.8 percent.
Nonetheless, Georgia Labor Commissioner Mark Butler said the number of Georgians on the job rose to a record 4.92 million last month - up 97,100 jobs from a year ago.
"We're only two months into the year, but we started 2019 strong," he said. "During what is normally a slow period for Georgia we gained more than 10,000 jobs and boosted the labor force by about 7,000. Those are solid gains."
Contact Dave Flessner at dflessner@timesfreepress.com or at 757-6340.