Recession or not, unemployment rates released late last week by the Georgia Dept. of Labor show jobless figures falling to 8 percent in Fayette County and to 7.4 percent in Peachtree City.
The September jobless rate in Fayette dipped to 8 percent, half a percentage point better than the 8.5 percent rate in August. The rate in September 2009 was also 8.5 percent.
Fayette’s unemployment figures for September reflect 4,036 people out of work in a workforce of 50,319.
The unemployment rate in Peachtree City also took a measurable dive in September, with the 7.8 percent rate from August giving way to a rate of 7.4 percent. The jobless rate a year ago was 7.7 percent.
Peachtree City has a workforce listed at 16,174, with 1,196 of those out of work.
As for the 10-county Atlanta Regional Commission area, the ARC unemployment rate fell from 10.3 percent in August to 10 percent in September. That compares to the 10.1 percent jobless rate in September 2009.
The ARC area has an estimated 210,348 people unemployed in a workforce of 2,109,704.
The situation was identical in the 28-county Atlanta Metropolitan Statistical Area, where the jobless rate in September fell to 10 percent, down from 10.3 percent in August, representing more than 265,000 people out of work.
Across Georgia the recession-fueled unemployment rate held at 10 percent, with more than 460,000 people out of work in a workforce of 4.2 million.
And across the U.S., the September rate also held at 9.6 percent. Nationally there are an estimated 14.77 million people out of work.
The whole story of unemployment resides beyond the figures supplied in the monthly figures. Official unemployment rates listed across America by states and the federal government do not account for those no longer looking for work and those who are underemployed by taking part-time jobs
