By Keith Whitcomb Jr. Staff Writer
While the unemployment rate dropped by a little over 3% in June, it’s still high.
The Department of Labor said Friday, the seasonally adjusted statewide unemployment rate for June was 9.4%, down from 12.8% in May.
“(It’s) obviously good news that it’s declining and moving in the right direction, but we still have 50,000 Vermonters unemployed on either traditional unemployment or the (Pandemic Unemployment Assistance program), so we’ll have to wait and see how the pandemic unfolds and its effect on us here and whether we can continue to open up the economy, which is a great concern to me,” said Gov. Phil Scott at a Friday news briefing.
Getting everyone back to work will be a slow process, said Michael Harrington, commissioner of the Department of Labor, at the briefing.
He said the backlog of unemployment claims has largely been addressed, though the state is still using aging computer equipment and some claims are still getting stuck.
Harrington said new unemployment claims are being made at a average rate of about 1,500 per week, but this isn’t being reflected in the job market. It’s suspected that some of these are fraudulent claims and the DOL is investigating. He said other states have been reporting fraud as well, but at much higher levels than what Vermont is seeing.
According to the monthly data released by the DOL, the unemployment rate for the country in June was 11.1%, a decrease of 2.2% from the previous month. Seasonally adjusted data from June shows the civilian labor force decreased by 2,370 from revised May estimates, while the number of employed people increased by 9,759. The number of unemployed persons went down by 12,129.
The unemployment rate varies across the state. According to the DOL, the rates for its 17 job markets are not seasonally adjusted and range from 7.1% in Newbury to 16.6% in Woodstock. In the Rutland labor market, the unemployment rate in June was 11.3%, down from 15.1% in May. In the Barre-Montpelier labor market, it was 7.6% in June and 10.4% in May.
A year ago in June, the rates were 2.8% in Rutland and 2.1% in Barre-Montpelier.
Wendy Morse, southwestern Vermont regional manager for the DOL, said earlier this week that statewide there are 3,900 jobs posted on Vermont Joblink, the state’s job posting service. In Rutland County, there are 317 jobs posted, while there are 659 posted in Washington County. These are all primarily in the retail, and health care sectors.
“I would say hiring has picked back up again,” she said. “We are seeing more employers connecting with us for their recruitment needs.”
According to Carrie Engel, of Indeed.com, a popular job posting service, on July 10 there were 35.9% fewer jobs posted in Vermont through the site than on that same day last year, though that number appears to have been decreasing since April.
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