Wyoming Jobless Rate Drops, Not Entirely Good News
Wyoming's seasonally adjusted unemployment rate dropped from 4.5 percent in March to 4.3 percent in April.
The April 2017 jobless rate was down by 1.3 percent from the April 2016 Wyoming unemployment figure of 5.6 percent.
But a Senior Economist with the Research and Planning section of the Wyoming Department of Workforce Services says the new numbers are not as positive as they seem at first glance.
David Bullard says part of the reason for the decline is clearly because of a drop in the number of people in the workforce. For example, Bullard says that while both Campbell and Natrona counties saw big drops in unemployment, the labor forces in both counties are down by about 2,000 people each compared to a year ago.
The state overall lost 6,400 jobs between April 2016 and last month, according to the report.
But in other areas, the drop in unemployment really is good news. Bullard says Laramie County's unemployment rate dropped from 4 percent in March to 3.4 percent in April.
But the size of Laramie County's workforce has actually increased slightly over the past year. In terms of raw numbers, the unemployment rate in several Wyoming counties did show big declines between March and April.
Sublette County's jobless rate dropped from 8.1 percent to 4.7 percent. Campbell County's unemployment rate dropped by 3.3 percent (8.4 percent to 5.1 percent). Other big drops were seen in Converse County (6.9 percent to 4.3 percent) and Natrona County (7.8 percent to 5.5 percent).
Even with the decline, Natrona County still tied Fremont County for the highest unemployment rate in the state, while Albany County had the lowest unemployment rate in the state at 2.6 percent.
Goshen County had a jobless rate of 2.7 percent, while Niobrara County had the third-lowest unemployment rate at 2.8 percent.