Mahoning Valley's unemployment rate drops to 5.3 percent in September

YOUNGSTOWN — The Mahoning Valley’s nonseasonally adjusted unemployment rate dropped to 5.3 percent last month from 7.4 percent in September 2017, according to Ohio Department of Job and Family Services data released today.

Employment in the tri-county area, however, dropped to 220,600 people, down from 227,000 last September, and the number of people in the labor force dropped by 12,000 to 233,000.

In Mahoning County, the unemployment rate dropped from 7.6 percent in September 2017 to 5.3 percent last month. In Youngstown, the unemployment rate was 6.9 percent last month, down from 8.7 percent last September.

In Trumbull County, the state reported the unemployment rate in September was 5.7 percent, down from 8 percent the previous September.

The September unemployment rate for Columbiana County dropped from 5.5 percent to 4.6 percent.

In Ohio, the seasonally adjusted unemployment rate was 4.6 percent in September, unchanged from August and down from 5 percent in September 2017.

The national unemployment rate dropped to 3.7 percent in September, a decline of 0.2 percentage points from the previous month, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.