Unemployment rates hold steady in the region

Dalondo Moultrie, The Seguin Gazette

President Donald Trump claimed a win Thursday morning when he announced huge jobs gains for the month of June.

The president held a press conference and released details about record gains in May and June, while an area unemployment office pointed to remaining high unemployment numbers locally.

“Our nation’s economy has broken another record as 4.8 million jobs were added in June, bringing the economic comeback to 7.5 million jobs added over the past two months, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics’ June Employment situation report,” read information on the White House’s official website. “Millions of Americans have felt the costs of the economic shutdown due to COVID-19, and while the speed of this recovery has far exceeded expectations, jobs have still not recovered the ground lost since the economic shutdown began.”

Workforce Solutions Alamo keeps track of unemployment claims in a 13-county region including Bexar, Comal and Guadalupe counties. Workforce has yet to see huge gains in jobs and continues to see a pretty steady unemployment rate, CEO Adrian Lopez said.

The regional network had collected data through May and was awaiting June’s unemployment and jobs figures, which should be available within a few weeks, he said. But through May, his association found a fairly steady unemployment rate, Lopez said.

“In a nutshell for the region, we were at about 13.7%,” he said. “We’re just kind of hanging around 13% from April to May.”

From about the beginning of March to June 19 in Guadalupe County, 11,828 people successfully filed unemployment claims, Lopez said. Bexar County had the highest number of claims of the 13 counties in the region, taking up about 80% of the 230,340 claims in the Alamo district, he said.

However, of the remaining counties, Comal County was most effected by unemployment with 12,954 claims since March, Lopez said. Guadalupe County was next.

June’s numbers could show improvements and point to a reduction in unemployment claims, he said. But without that data, he was unsure about the current state of business in the region.

“It’s hard to tell here what’s happening,” Lopez said. “What I can say is in this region, almost on a weekly basis, we’re seeing about 14,000 job postings or so that are active. … There are jobs being created and posted.

“The issue here is it’s still not matching the unemployment claims.” 

Nonfarm payroll employment jobs rose by 4.8 million in June across the country, according to information provided on the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics’ website. The national unemployment rate fell to 11.1%, according to the information.

“These improvements in the labor market reflected the continued resumption of economic activity that had been curtailed in March and April due to the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic and efforts to contain it,” a news release posted on the website read. “In June, employment in leisure and hospitality rose sharply. Notable job gains also occurred in retail trade, education and health services, other services, manufacturing, and professional and business services.”

The nation’s unemployment rate declined by 2.2 percentage points in June and the number of people unemployed fell by 3.2 million to 17.8 million, according to the release. 

Dalondo Moultrie is the assistant managing editor of the Seguin Gazette. You can e-mail him at dalondo.moultrie@seguingazette.com