Dalton unemploymentIn 23 years of recruiting workers for hundreds of employers across Southeast Tennessee and Northwest Georgia, Manpower franchise owner Mark Campbell says he’s never before had so much trouble getting enough qualified workers.
“We’re doing all the recruiting we can, but it’s very difficult right now to get enough of the right people for all of the available jobs,” said Campbell, who operates Manpower offices in Chattanooga; Cleveland, Tenn., and Dalton, Ga. “A lot of jobs are coming back as the economy improves, and with more people already employed, we’re not seeing as many people coming in with the skills we need to fill all these jobs.”
The jobless rate fell last month to the lowest level in seven years in metro Chattanooga, Cleveland and Dalton, according to figures released Thursday by the Tennessee Department of Labor and Workforce Development and the Georgia Department of Labor.
Although the region hasn’t regained all of the more than 30,000 jobs lost in the Great Recession from 2008 to 2010, employers in the three metro areas have added more than 9,000 jobs in just the past year — the fastest growth in more than a decade.
Unemployment in the six-county Chattanooga metro area fell last month to 5.2 percent — the lowest rate since April 2008 and half the 10.2 percent peak reached in June 2009.