Unemployment in Georgia fell last month to the lowest level in nearly nine years, and for the first time since July 2007 the jobless rate in the Peach State was below the U.S. unemployment rate during August.
The Georgia Department of Labor announced today that the state's seasonally adjusted unemployment rate was 4.9 percent last month, down one-tenth of a percentage point from 5 percent in July. The rate in August 2015 was 5.6 percent.
"This is the first time in nine years that Georgia's unemployment rate has been as low as the national rate," Georgia Labor Commissioner Mark Butler said. "When we look back to that time, we see that our job market has made significant improvements, not only as far as the rate is concerned, but we also have more jobs and more people employed than ever before."
In July 2007, the Georgia rate was 4.6 percent and the U.S. rate was 4.7 percent.
The number of employed Georgians reached an all-time high of 4,651,399, as 12,928 people were hired in August. At the same time, the number of unemployed residents fell by 749 to 241,737, its lowest level since October 2007..
Over the past year, Georgia employers have added 104,000 jobs. The state's 2.4 percent growth in employment in the past 12 months was nearly 50 percent faster than the U.S. growth pace of 1.7 percent in the same period, Butler said.