By Maxine Shapiro, KERA 90.1 business commentator
Dallas, TX – The Texas Workforce Commission released its labor market figures for August, and there's actually some welcome news in the report. I'm Maxine Shapiro with KERA Marketplace Midday.
28,500 new jobs were added last month. Not only does it reverse the downtrend, it was the highest gain since May. Over half the increase came from the Educational and Health Services Group and the Government. And guess what sector was the only one to lose jobs? Right - manufacturing. Educational and Health Services has added 23-thousand new jobs since the beginning of the year. That's the most from any industry. Over the past year, Texas government employment has expanded 1.5 percent, equaling almost 24-thousand new jobs. That's a lot of government jobs for a state that was cutting social programs left and right. I think I need to find out where all these new jobs are going, and how the state, counties, or cities are paying for these new workers. I'm thrilled for the employed, but still a little curious.
So the seasonally adjusted Texas unemployment rate stayed at 6.6 percent - still well above August's national unemployment rate of 6 percent. In fact, the state hasn't gone below 6.2 percent all year. Now, the Metropolitan Statistical Areas - MSA - they're just basically large populated areas - saw the same increase in education and government. But the MSA is not seasonally adjusted and with the start of school education, would see an increase.
Now, I thought this was pretty interesting: retail trade gained about 3,700 new jobs in August for back-to-school shopping. That figure is consistent with the past two years in August. But in August 2000, almost 13-thousand retail jobs were added. Boy, were we spending.
And both Dallas and Fort Worth /Arlington unemployment fell three-tenths of a percent. And may this trend continue. For KERA Marketplace Midday, I'm Maxine Shapiro.
Marketplace Midday Reports air on KERA 90.1 Monday - Friday at 1:04 p.m.
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