Maine’s jobless rate unchanged at 4.7% in January

(The Center Square) – Maine’s unemployment rate remained largely unchanged in January after adding about 3,500 new jobs, according to a monthly state report.

The preliminary, seasonally adjusted unemployment rate last month fell from December’s 4.1% rate, which was revised from a previous estimate of 4.7%, the Maine Department of Labor said. The stagnant job growth reflects a tight labor market that’s being fueled by staffing shortages and rising inflation which are putting a squeeze on many business owners.

There were 631,800 seasonally adjusted nonfarm jobs in January, which is about 3,500 more jobs than in the previous month, the agency said. Most of those gains were in construction, health care and the leisure and hospitality industries.

Unlike previous monthly reports, the Department of Labor compared data over a three-month period from November to January which the agency said provides “a better indication of workforce conditions as they smooth some of the variability in sample-based estimates, and they reflect revisions to estimates for previous months.”

The average employment gains over the three month period was 4,600 new jobs, the agency said. A majority of the new jobs, roughly 80%, were in the leisure and hospitality industries, which are recovering from sharp losses at the beginning of the pandemic.

Overall, the state’s unemployment rate decreased 0.4 percentage points, the labor force participation rate decreased 0.2 points and the employment to population ratio decreased 0.4 points during the three-month period.

“The three-month average of jobs through January was higher than the pre-pandemic average for 2019 in professional and business services, construction, manufacturing, and educational services; it was lower in health care and social assistance, leisure and hospitality, state and local governments, and retail trade,” the agency wrote.

The state’s labor force participation rate, or the number of people 16 or older who worked or were unemployed and looking for work, remained largely unchanged at 59.3% in December, according to the agency.

Meanwhile, the number of unemployed workers in Maine in January stood at 28,200, the state agency reported.

Maine’s unemployment rate in January was still higher than the national rate, which dropped to 4%, according to data from the U.S. Labor Department.

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