County achieves all-time low unemployment rate

Floyd County managed to achieve a record low unemployment rate in October, according to a release from the Georgia Department of Labor.

The county went from a 4.6% unemployment rate in October 2020 to its current rate of 2.4%.

The 15-county Northwest Georgia region as a whole saw its jobless rate fall from as high as 13.3% in April 2020 to 2.1% in October 2021.

Labor Commissioner Mark Butler referenced in his release the job openings going unfilled.

“We are continuing to see alltime low unemployment rates across the state along with job growth in all of our statistical areas,” Butler said. “The focus now is getting more Georgians into the workforce to fill these critical positions, particularly as we gear up for a strong holiday employment season.”

The labor force in Floyd County increased by 275, putting the number of eligible workers for the month of October at 43,893. Of those eligible workers, 42,840 were employed in October, which is an increase of 1,208 from the same time last year.

There were 41,500 jobs in the county at the end of October, which is 1,200 more jobs than at the same time in 2020. In fact, Floyd County has seen a slight increase in available jobs since the beginning of August.

Statewide, the number of jobs in Georgia increased by 521,000 after nearly 610,000 jobs were lost during the pandemic in March and April of 2020.

According to the GDOL, the retail trade, wholesale trade, transportation and warehousing sectors have all seen an increase in available jobs across the state. Accommodations and food services were hit the hardest by the pandemic and were still down by 52,000 jobs in October.

The number of unemployment claims went down by 28% locally from September to October. When compared to last October, claims were down by about 88%.

The GDOL’S online job listing service at Employgeorgia.com showed about 519 active job postings in Floyd County for October. On Sunday, Employ Georgia showed 172 active Rome-based job postings.