Carson City jobless rate falls to 4 percent

Nevada’s raw jobless rate fell another two tenths in October to just 4.2 percent statewide.

The seasonally adjusted rate, however, was a bit higher, 4.4 percent, but that’s still down from 4.5 percent in September.

Dave Schmidt, chief economist for the Department of Employment, Training and Rehabilitation, said the decline comes in significant part because Nevada has added 45,800 new jobs in the past year. He said 3,100 of those new jobs were added over the past month in Las Vegas but the Reno Metropolitan Reporting Area added 2,600 more jobs despite being less than a third the population of the Las Vegas area.

The jobless rate in Reno is now just 3.3 percent, essentially full employment. That translates to just 8,400 people out of work in a pool of 256,400.

Schmidt said there’s growth and expansion across nearly all of the state and metro area unemployment rates continue to fall.

Carson City’s unemployment rate fell from 4.2 percent to 4 percent over the month with just 1,100 people in a labor force of 26,500 looking for work.

The Las Vegas reporting area fell three tenths to 4.4 percent in October.

Statewide, there are 1.5 million in the labor force. Just 67,100 are out of work as of the end of October.

In Douglas County, the unemployment dipped a tenth from 4 percent to 3.9 percent with 895 people out of 23,213 workers seeking a job.

Churchill County was steady at 3.7 percent unemployment. Just 416 people were reported looking for work in a pool of 11,254.

Lyon County improved by two tenths in October. The jobless rate there is 4.8 percent. With 22,389 in the work force, only 1,076 are looking for a job.

The Elko reporting area also was steady in October but that area’s jobless rate is just 3 percent, like Reno, essentially full employment. Elko has a labor force of 28,700 with just 900 looking for work.

Overall, unemployment is below 4 percent in 12 of Nevada’s 17 counties. The lowest rate in the state is in Eureka County, just 2.5 percent. The only county that reported an increase in the jobless rate for October was White Pine where unemployment spiked up from 3.1 to 3.4 percent.