St. Lucie Unemployment Rate

[Huggs]

http://www.tcpalm.com/news/2010/mar/10/unemployment-treasure-coast-144-january/

Unemployment on Treasure Coast at 14.4% in January
By staff report

Wednesday, March 10, 2010

The unemployment rate for Indian River, Martin, Okeechobee, and St. Lucie counties was 14.4 percent in January. This was 3.7 percentage points above the region’s rate a year ago and 2.2 percentage points above the current state rate of 12.2 percent.

Unemployment rates in the counties that make up the Workforce Solutions region were: 14.9 percent in St. Lucie, 14.4 percent in Indian River, 13.9 percent in Okeechobee, and 13.6 percent in Martin.

From a labor force of 267,495 there were 38,540 unemployed residents in the region. Higher unemployment rates in the Workforce Solutions region were due to sharp declines in the housing and financial services markets.

IMO, the higher unemployment rate is due to the fact of the seasonal hirings now laying those people back off and it is now appearing on the grid (4+weeks to benefits).  I wonder what the underemployment stats look like.  In any case, unemployment is still rising, those that have hit the end of their benefits are falling off the radar.  Unemployment is much higher than what is being reported, IMO.

[Carl]

The really sad part is our elected officials are throwing tens
of millions of dollars at an entrepreneur or three to absorb
maybe 1 to 2% of these jobless folks. This isn't the answer.

Skills-appropriate jobs are needed. We need work for people
that can sew jeans, not splice genes. We need jobs building
boats and ships, not making them sink on the silver screen.

We seem to have our priorities skewed. It's almost as if the
people running the show have an agenda different than
what they stated in their oath to serve.

[TIMNEELYforMAYOR]

We need to help Businesses within our city grow.    We can do this is a number of ways from
offering loans to businesses to setting up a free business to business advice program.    The
loan program could be run with the cost being paid by interest from the loans and not by the city.   
The business to business program would be very low cost.  Letting them use one of many meeting rooms
the city owns, posting links and info on the city website.    We can help by offering tools to the
estimated 9300 businesses in Port St. Lucie to improve their business, grow sales and hire staff.   
If 5% hired 1 additional full time employee, we would cut the unemployed rate by 465 people.   
This would cost nowhere near the $39million for a digital film studio and could bring in the same
number of jobs.

We need programs that any business in the city can utilize.

[Carl]

If 5% hired 1 additional full time employee, we would cut the unemployed rate by 465 people.   
This would cost nowhere near the $39million for a digital film studio and could bring in the same
number of jobs.

Lord. Have. Mercy.

That is a rather profound observation there. I wish I had said that.

A mere tweak to the local economy, maybe by dropping the
$121 fee just to sell used books on eBay, for example, would
have a better and quicker impact than tens of millions spent
(which we don't have) on someone's dream adventure.

Sheesh. Somebody pinch me.

[Huggs]

From the Palm Beach Post today:

Florida jobless rate hits highest level on record
by Jeff Ostrowski
The region’s jobless rates fell slightly in February but remained near their highest levels since the 1992 recession, and Florida unemployment rose to its highest number on record.

Palm Beach County unemployment dipped to 12.4 percent last month from 12.5 percent in January, the Florida Agency for Workforce Innovation said today.

Martin County’s jobless rate dropped to 13.2 percent in February from 13.6 percent in January. St. Lucie County unemployment fell to 14.9 percent from 15 percent.

The statewide seasonally adjusted unemployment rate rose to 12.2 percent, up from 12 percent in January and well above the national average of 9.7 percent.

Agency for Workforce Innovation Director Cynthia R. Lorenzo tried to put an optimistic spin on the worst jobs report on state statistics that date back four decades.

“Last month’s positive job growth of 26,300 jobs and a 300 percent reduction in the number of layoff notices since the peak last May are both encouraging signs of an improving economy,” Lorenzo said in a statement.

[Carl]

As long as we keep taking 50, 60, 70 million dollars and
throw it at someone to set up shop and "promise" us a
couple hundred jobs, we'll have HIGH jobless numbers. We
need to create tens of thousands of jobs, not 500, and we
need jobs for Manny the Manufacturer, not Dizzy the Digitizer.

I have no problem seeing Digital Domain as the icing on the
cake, but where's the damn cake??

[Lil B]

Unemployment Rate Drops Sharply Across the Treasure Coast

By Paul Ivice
May 21, 2010

Unemployment fell sharply in April across the Treasure Coast.

St. Lucie County, which has the area’s highest jobless rate, also had the biggest drop, down a full percentage point from the previous month to 13.7 percent.

Though St. Lucie County’s rate fell sharply, it remained the fourth-highest rate in Florida behind Flagler (15.4 percent), Hernando (14.3) and Marion (13.9) counties.

Martin County’s rate dropped almost as much to 11.8 percent from 12.7 percent in March. Indian River County’s rate fell to 13.1 percent from 13.9 percent the previous month.

Florida’s seasonally adjusted unemployment rate of 12 percent in April is a retreat from the 12.3 percent rate in March that was the highest recorded in the state since the current calculation method began in 1970.

It was the first monthly decline in the state’s unemployment rate since February 2006.

The state’s rate remains significantly higher than the national rate, which inched up to 9.9 percent in April.

The number of unemployed Treasure Coast residents actively seeking work went down by 2,380 to 32,520, while the total labor force decreased by about 1,300.

Rebecca Rust, the chief economist for Florida’s Agency for Workforce Innovation, said the state gained 15,500 jobs in April, about half of which were related to the U.S. Census.

Rust said the two sectors with the biggest increase in jobs were government and health services, particularly ambulatory health care services such as doctors’ offices.

She also speculated that the improving employment environment would cause at least some discouraged workers to return to the job market, thus muting some of the gains.

http://www.tcpalm.com/news/2010/may/21/unemployment-rate-drops-sharply-across-the-coast/