Vermont jobless rate falls in January Both Windsor, Windham counties see rise in employment

By Cynthia Prairie
©2023 Telegraph Publishing LLC

The state has seen a slight drop in the unemployment rate for the month of January, the Vermont Department of Labor announced on Monday, bringing it down to a seasonally-adjusted unemployment rate of 2.9 percent. The United States rate for January was 3.4 percent.

Both the state and federal number reflects a decrease of one-tenth of one percentage point from December 2022’s revised estimate. The civilian labor force participation rate was 63.4 percent in January, unchanged from the prior month.

According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, “seasonal adjustment” is a statistical technique that attempts to measure and remove the influences of predictable seasonal patterns to reveal how employment and unemployment change from month to month.

In Windsor County the unemployment rate is 2.0 percent among a population of 59,196, with 29,453 people employed and 592 still jobless. Windsor County is home to the towns of Andover, Baltimore Cavendish, Chester, Ludlow, Springfield, Weston and Windsor.

In Windham County, with a population of 46,090 according to 2021 Census, the unemployment rate was 2.6 percent with 20,748 people working and 551 employable people out of work. Windham County is home to the towns Athens, Grafton,  Londonderry, Newfane, Stratton and Windham.

Labor Commissioner Michael Harrington said that his department also released revised historical data for calendar year 2022 and years prior. “Overall, calendar year 2022 was stronger than previously reported,” Harrington said. “Key metrics that were previously underreported have been revised up.”

These metrics, he added, include:

• the number of filled Vermont jobs,
• the number of employed persons in Vermont and]
• the size of Vermont’s labor force.

“In addition,” Harrington said, “the number of unemployed persons and the unemployment rate were also re-estimated higher; however, even at these new elevated levels, Vermont is still considered to be at full employment. Based on this data, these are still favorable times for jobseekers as the number of available jobs is still two times higher than the number of unemployed individuals.”

According to the new figures, the seasonally-adjusted data for January reported an increase of 1,700 jobs over the revised December data. There was an increase of 2,400 jobs between the preliminary and the revised December estimates due to the inclusion of more data.

Those business sectors with a notable increases include:

• Professional & Technical Services (+600 jobs or +3.6%),
• Construction (+300 jobs or +1.9%) and
• Retail Trade (+600 jobs or +1.7%).

Industries with a notable decrease included:

• Arts, Entertainment & Recreation (-200 jobs or -4.8%),
• State Government (-400 jobs or -2.2%) and
• Private Educational Services (-200 jobs or -1.5%).