Unemployment Rates Continue to Drop in Georgia Mountains Region

The unemployment rate in the Georgia Mountains region in May was 4 percent, down from 4.3 percent in April.

State Labor Commissioner Mark Butler noted that is over a full percentage point lower than this time last year.

Butler said the rate declined as the number of employed residents rose.

“The rate going down can sometimes be for bad news, but that’s not what we’re seeing in the Georgia Mountains region,” Butler said. “We saw almost 2,200 individuals actually return to workforce and go out there start looking for work. And we saw almost 3,000 gain employment during the month of May.”

One other note, however, is that the number of initial claims for unemployment insurance rose by 15.5 percent.

Butler said the good news though is that most of those lay offs are temporary.

“The good news for those individuals who are laid off is that it’s usually a temporary layoff,” Butler said. “For those that are out there looking for work, take a look at our job posting system, employgeorgia.com. For the month of May we saw about 1,900 new jobs posted in the Georgia Mountains area, which is very strong job growth for that area.”

In Franklin County, the unemployment rate in May was 4.6% – down from 4.9% in April.

Franklin County’s total labor force last month was 9491 – of that 438 workers were receiving unemployment benefits.

In Hart County, the unemployment rate in May stood at 4.8% – down from 5% in April.

Hart County’s total work force in May was listed at 10,696 – of that 517 workers were out of a job.

Butler reminds those looking for work to visit the Labor Departments employment Web site at www.employgeorgia.com.