State's jobless rate drops to 6.9 percent

The Minnesota unemployment rate dropped to a seasonally adjusted 6.9 percent in September, according to figures released today by the Minnesota Department of Employment and Economic Development (DEED).

The unemployment rate was 0.3 percent below the August unemployment rate and well below the U.S. unemployment rate in September of 9.1 percent.

Employment statewide declined by 7,400 jobs in September. In the past year, however, Minnesota employers have added 27,700 jobs, representing a growth rate of 1 percent.

"Minnesota is slowly pulling out of the recession, gaining 53,600 jobs over the past two years," said DEED Commissioner Mark Phillips. "Declining requests for new unemployment insurance claims, strength in the temp help sector and other positive data are hopeful signs that the recovery will continue."

Government led all sectors in September, gaining 7,000 jobs, mostly related to education hiring. Others sectors that added jobs were other services (up 1,600), financial services (up 1,300), and mining and logging (up 100). Information held steady during the month.

Job losses occurred in trade, transportation and utilities (down 4,800), leisure and hospitality (down 3,800), manufacturing (down 3,700), education and health services (down 2,300), construction (down 1,900), and professional and business services (down 900).

Over the past year, job gains have occurred in trade, transportation and utilities (up 7,100), education and health services (up 7,000), leisure and hospitality (up 5,700), professional and business services (up 5,600), manufacturing (up 4,000), financial activities (up 2,500), other services (up 2,200), and logging and mining (up 100).

Year-over-year job losses occurred in government (down 3,800), construction (down 1,700) and information (down 1,000).

In the state Metropolitan Statistical Areas, job gains occurred in the past year in the Rochester MSA (up 2.8 percent), Mankato MSA (up 2.5 percent), Duluth-Superior MSA (up 1.3 percent) and Minneapolis-St. Paul MSA (up 1.2 percent). The St. Cloud MSA was down 0.4 percent.

Tags: minnesota news, news, updates, jobs