Georgia ended 2019 on a record high note according to the State Department of Labor, which released the numbers this week. Commissioner Mark Butler says Georgia saw increases in several areas…increases in jobs, work force and employed residents.
“First of all, we set another record for low unemployment rate at 3.2 percent which is the lowest it has ever been in recorded history, but also we set records all across the board through all the major indicators,” according to Butler. “That includes total number of people in the workforce, total number of jobs and total number of individuals actually employed. So, it’s kind of hard to have any better of the year than what Georgia had, setting all-time records for low unemployment and also for employment, jobs and labor force.”
He did cite one possible area of concern.
“We do need to grow our labor force at a faster rate, right now we’re only growing our labor force over the year at about a third of what we’re actually growing jobs and you cannot keep that pace up. I think Georgia’s done a great job in bringing in new business and also seeing our local business that we have around the state growing jobs, but we need to really start concentrating more on building the workers to go into those jobs.”
The commissioner says in spite of concerns regarding the labor force, there is another bright spot for state workers.
“If you take a look at our current numbers, how tight the labor market is, I think you’ll continue to see people’s wages rise because competition for the current talent that we have is going to get even more fierce in the months ahead.”
The biggest job growth came in education and health services, followed by leisure and hospitality and trade, transportation and utilities.
Georgia’s unemployment rate was 3.2 percent at the end of 2019.
