Oregon's January Unemployment Rate Decrease Largest in Nation

Yesterday, the Bureau of Labor Statistics released January’s state-by-state unemployment figures. This comparison lets us know how Oregon matches up to the rest of nation’s states.

Over the month, Oregon’s unemployment rate decrease of 0.4 percentage point was more than any other state in the United States. Idaho, Maine, and Rhode Island followed with a decrease of 0.3 percentage point, and 10 states saw a decrease of 0.2 percentage point. Nineteen states saw a bigger over-the-year decrease than Oregon, which came in at 0.9 percentage point below its January 2014 rate.

State Employment Economist Nick Beleiciks says, “The large drop in Oregon’s January unemployment rate was the result of very strong job growth in recent months. More Oregonians are employed than ever before and the strength of the labor market is showing across the major indicators.”

Oregon's strong job growth over the year (3.3%) was sixth in the nation, tied with Washington, and just ahead of California (3.2%) and Idaho (3.1%). North Dakota (4.3%) saw the highest job growth among states between January 2014 and January 2015, followed by Utah (4.0%).

Over the month, Idaho’s 1.4 percent job growth was by far the highest in the nation. Oregon’s 0.4 percent job growth was the 11th highest.

While we don't have data on all states from February yet, we do have Oregon's February employment data, which can be found in our earlier blog post Oregon’s Unemployment Rate Falls to 5.8 Percent in February.