COLUMBUS, Ohio – Ohio’s unemployment rate for August remained unchanged from the previous month.
The Ohio Department of Job and Family Services released last month’s 5.7 percent unemployment rate figure Friday morning.
July’s report had showed the state’s unemployment rate at 5.7 percent, which was below the nation’s jobless rate. But Ohio’s figure was up from the seasonally adjusted rate in May and June of 5.5 percent.
Some analysts have said Ohio’s unemployment rate is low, compared to 10.6 during the depths of the recession in 2009-10, because the state’s labor force has shrunk, meaning fewer people are looking for work than across the nation as a whole.
“When John Kasich came into office, Ohio was already nearly a year into a strong economic recovery that was lowering the unemployment rate by creating jobs…Kasich’s policies have failed to create the jobs Ohioans need, all while shifting the tax burden onto middle class families,” Ohio Democratic Party chairman Chris Redfern said in a statement Friday.
Ohio’s nonfarm wage and salary employment decreased 12,400 over July. And the number of unemployed workers in Ohio rose by 7,000 — from 316,000 in June to 323,000 in July.