MONTGOMERY — Alabama's unemployment rate dipped slightly to 3% as the number of people employed in the state reached its highest point in more than two years, officials said Friday.
The February jobless rate fell one-tenth of a percent from January and represented 68,703 people without jobs compared to more than 85,000 a year earlier, when the rate was 3.8%, according to a statement from the Alabama Department of Labor.
The total number of people employed in the state increased by 25,456 over the year to almost 2.2 million, the agency said, the highest point since January 2020 before the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic.Shelby County in metro Birmingham had the state's lowest jobless rate at 2.1%, slightly lower than Cullman County in north Alabama at 2.2%. Wilcox County in rural west Alabama had the state's highest unemployment rate at 10.5% followed by adjoining Lowndes County at 7.9%.
People are also reading… In the Wiregrass area, Coffee and Geneva counties had the lowest unemployment at 2.7% in February. Other area counties' percentages included, Covington at 2.8%, Dale at 2.9%, Houston at 3.0%, Henry at 3.1% and Barbour at 4.8%, which was down from 5.3% in January and 6.7% reported in February 2021. All area counties were lower than January's percentages.
The Dothan Metropolitan Statistical Area's unemployment in February was reported at 3.0%, down from the previous month's total of 3.3% and 3.8% for the same period last year. Major cities with the lowest unemployment rates are: Homewood and Vestavia Hills at 1.8%, Alabaster and Trussville at 1.9%, and Hoover and Madison at 2.1%. Major cities with the highest unemployment rates are: Selma at 8.6%, Prichard at 6.7%, and Anniston at 5.9%.
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