Weather helps jobless rates
JIM FALL/DAILY FORUM
Construction workers at the new Southview II apartment complex south of the Maryville Wal-Mart are moving ahead with framing the first of 32 new units being added to the existing 40-apartment complex. Favorable weather conditions helped reduce the December unemployment rate in Nodaway County to 3.3 percent.
“We are just pretty close to full employment in Nodaway County,” pretty well confirms the latest jobless figures made available this week through the Missouri Economic Research and Information Center.
The final total count of unemployed persons in Nodaway County reported that 399 of the county’s civilian work force of 11,996 — an average of 3.3 percent — were without jobs.
That 3.3 unemployment figure is the most favorable for Nodaway County not only during the past year but since November of 2007.
Kim Mildward, director of workforce development at the Northwest Missouri Regional Council of Governments in Maryville, Wednesday supported her statement regarding “full employment” by noting that “not only have we had fewer claims, but we have a lot of job openings.
“Three of our major manufacturers are hiring employees. They have active position openings posted on their websites.”
The December jobless rate of 3.3 percent is a full percentage point below the same period during 2014, and it also reflects drops of 0.1 percentage points in each of the past two months.
“The relatively good weather during December helped with construction jobs,” Mildward said. “We did not see the seasonal job layoffs we normally have during that time because of the cold weather.”
The overall unemployment rate for the 18-county Northwest Region of Missouri was set at 3.7 percent for December, below the statewide average of 4.4 percent for December.
Holt County, at 2.6 percent, had the lowest unemployment rate in the region during December, followed closely by Worth County at 2.7 percent. Gentry County was close to that level with only 2.8 percent of its workforce not working.
Linn County had the most unemployment in the area at 5.9 percent, followed by Sullivan County at 5.2 percent.
Andrew County was just slightly below Nodaway County with a 3.2 percent jobless rate. Unemployment was at 3.9 percent in Buchanan County.
Locally, Nodaway County began 2015 with a jobless rate of 5.4 percent, but that percentage climbed to 5.8 percent the following month before topping 6 percent in May at 6.3 percent, climbing to 6.6 percent in June, and peaking at 6.7 percent during July.
Nodaway County’s lowest-ever jobless rate was 0.6 percent recorded in October 1999. The county’s highest jobless rate recorded since January 1990 was reached in July 2010 at 9.1 percent.
