State: Employers added 2,800 robust jobs in August

Employers in Connecticut added 2,800 jobs in August while economists revised an initial small drop in employment in July to a strong gain, giving a boost to the state’s slow-growth labor force.

The unemployment rate of 3.6% was unchanged, lower than the U.S. rate of 3.7%.

Over the year, employment in Connecticut increased by 7,600, or less than half a percent. Six of the 10 major industry sectors gained employment in August and three declined. Financial activities remained unchanged.

Leisure and hospitality gained the most jobs, adding 1,400. Manufacturing jobs declined by 200, the second consecutive monthly loss in a sector that’s been a bright spot for Connecticut, home to three major Pentagon contractors and hundreds of suppliers.

Connecticut has recovered 83.5% of the 120,300 seasonally adjusted jobs lost in the Great Recession. The U.S. and most states have gained all lost jobs and added more.

The state’s private sector has recovered fully, at 103.4% of the jobs lost, but little hiring in government at the state and local levels has pulled down the average.

Employment grew in four of the six labor market areas and employment declines were posted in only the Waterbury labor market area.

Peter Gioia, economic adviser to the Connecticut Business & Industry Association, said the the August jobs report was a “welcome change.”

“If this pace of job recovery continues, we will get to full recovery by early 2020,” he said.

Economist Don KlepperSmith said the August job numbers “were clearly better than expected and were a pleasant upside surprise.”

“Still, when viewing the August data in context, the aggregate jobs data remains rather lackluster,” he said.

The long-term average annual growth rate of 1.1% over the last 50 years won’t be reached this year “and we can expect roughly half of that growth rate for 2019 after revisions are accounted for,” he said.

Connecticut is “slowly losing economic vitality, losing ground to key competing states in the process and will be challenged to reach its prior March 2008 employment peak of 1,717,100 jobs anytime soon,” KlepperSmith said.

Connecticut posted an increase of 7,600 jobs, or an increase of 0.4%, since August 2018. Gioia said that for this year, New Hampshire led New England with a 1.6% gain, followed by Rhode Island at 1.3%, Maine at 0.9%, Massachusetts at 0.8% and Maine at 0.8%.

The U.S. has added jobs at a 0.8% rate through the first eight months of the year, he said.

Stephen Singer can be reached at ssinger@courant. com.