WASHINGTON: The Richmond area’s unemployment rate declined to 3.8 percent in September from 4 percent in August, the Virginia Employment Commission reported Wednesday. The jobless rate was down from 4.3 percent in September 2016. The local rates reported by the state have not been adjusted for seasonal factors that may temporarily affect employment, such as school openings. A drop in the seasonally unadjusted rate from August to September is typically the case at this time of the year, said Ann Lang, senior economist for the commission. “You have the startup of public and private schools and colleges.” About 25,949 people were counted as unemployed in the Richmond region in September, down from 27,134 in August and 28,699 in September 2016, according to the unadjusted numbers. The region’s labor force also contracted slightly, to 686,048 in September compared with 686,510 in August. “It was a negligible change,” Lang said. However, the labor force grew from a year ago in September, when it was reported at 664,154. All of Virginia’s major metropolitan areas showed declines in unemployment from August to September, based on seasonally unadjusted numbers. When adjusted for seasonal factors, the Richmond area’s jobless rate was unchanged from August to September at 3.8 percent, and was down from 4.2 percent a year ago.
Virginia’s seasonally adjusted unemployment rate dropped slightly in September to 3.7 percent, down from 3.8 percent in August. It had been 4.1 percent a year ago. The U.S. seasonally adjusted unemployment rate was 4.2 percent in September, down from 4.4 percent the previous month. “Overall, it was a good report for Richmond,” said Christine Chmura, CEO and chief economist at Chmura Economics & Analytics in Richmond, which calculated the local seasonally adjusted rates. “The Richmond economy continues to grow at a faster pace than the state and the nation, but its pace of growth slowed in September.” Employers in the Richmond region added a net of about 10,500 jobs from September 2016 to September 2017, a job growth rate of 1.6 percent that outpaced the overall state rate of about 1 percent during the same time period. The region’s job growth rate was 2.2 percent in August compared with the same month a year earlier. Virginia’s October unemployment rate is scheduled to be released on Nov. 17.
