Unemployment rate in metropolitan Chattanooga drops as economy reopens

Chattanooga businesses rattled by the COVID-19 pandemic shutdowns in 2020 have yet to restore all of the jobs lost last year, but the local job market is still tightening and employers say they are having trouble filling some jobs.

"The demand for workers right now is quite strong, but the supply is very low," said Mark Campbell, owner of the Manpower franchise in Chattanooga. "There is a lot of hiring going on now as the economy reopens and bounces back. But as stimulus checks have gone out and extra unemployment benefits have continued, there is a segment of the working population that is less likely to be in the workforce right now."

Unemployment in metropolitan Chattanooga fell in January to 4.7%, down from 5.1% at the end of 2020. The Tennessee Department of Labor and Workforce Development said Chattanooga's jobless rate remained well below both the statewide average of 5.1% and the U.S. average of 6.3% at the start of 2021.

January's jobless rate in Chattanooga was still above the 3.6% rate of a year ago before the pandemic hit the U.S. economy and January's total employment in the 6-county Chattanooga metro area was down by 6,640 jobs, or 2.5%, compared with 12 months earlier.But local employers have still added back most of the 33,710 jobs shed in Chattanooga last April when the COVID-19 initially shut down most restaurants, stores, schools and other service businesses.

"Tennessee's job market is improving and should continue to grow in 2021 as vaccines are distributed, consumers become more confident and the stimulus package helps boost the economy," said Bill Fox, director of the Boyd Center for Business and Economic Research at the University of Tennessee. "But it's going to be a while before we get back to the employment levels we saw before the pandemic."

Fox said with more remote work, new technologies and shifting buying patterns, some of the jobs lost during the pandemic will not return. But hiring may improve if more workers feel safe about working with the public as vaccines lessen the virus and as schools, day cares and other support systems for parents return to normal.

On Friday, Tennessee Career Centers listed 236,109 open jobs across Tennessee. Campbell said he is able to find temporary jobs for nearly all of the workers coming to Manpower and the prevalence of hiring signs around Chattanooga shows that many other employers are also in need of more workers, he said.

"It's still a tight job market for many employers," Campbell said.

Despite the drop in unemployment in Chattanooga and nearby Cleveland in January, the jobless rate rose by 0.1% in neighboring metropolitan Dalton just south of the Tennessee-Georgia border, rising to 5.6%. Dalton was the only one of the 14 metropolitan areas in Georgia to show an increase in unemployment during January.

Dalton's 5.6% jobless rate at the start of 2021 was still below the 5.8% rate a year earlier, however. But Dalton still had 1,500 fewer workers on the job in January 2021 compared with a year earlier.

"There's still a shortage of workers and most of our carpet mills are trying to hire more staff," Dalton Mayor David Pennington said.

The Georgia Department of Labor listed 209,879 available jobs across the state on Friday.

"In January, we saw the (unemployment rate) drop in every metro area except one (Dalton)," Georgia Labor Commissioner Mark Butler said. "Starting the year off strong with such a positive indicator is promising, especially as we learn to adapt to this ever-changing workforce due to COVID."

Contact Dave Flessner at dflessner@timesfreepress.com or at 423-757-6340.