Local unemployment rate rises

Local unemployment rate rises

youngstown

The unemployment rate is rising for the first time this year in the Mahoning Valley, but overall the economic situation looks like a mix of good and bad.

The layoffs for RG Steel hurt the unemployment figures for not only Trumbull County, but also Mahoning and to an extent Columbiana counties, said George Zeller, a Cleveland-based economist.

“We know the RG Steel layoffs had an impact. We can see it in the weekly unemployment claims that have been released for Trumbull and Mahoning County,” he said. “I’ve been saying for the last few months that the Youngstown area was the fastest growing economically in the state that hasn’t been true the last few weeks.”

The non seasonal adjusted unemployment rate for the Mahoning Valley is 8 percent for June. It is up from the 7.4 percent rate from May, but is lower than the unemployment rate for the Valley from last June which was 10 percent.

The figures though are likely to be skewed due to the large number of seasonal employees in June, Zeller said. The month has one of the highest seasonal adjustments each year.