Snohomish County added 700 new jobs last month and still saw its unemployment rate rise, the state Department of Employment Security reported Tuesday.
“Sometimes you just can’t win,” said Donna Thompson, the labor economist who coves Snohomish County for the agency.
The jobless rate hit 4.7 percent last month, an increase of three tenths of a percentage point from June. The statewide rate had a similar rise, climbing from 5.4 percent in June to 5.7 percent in July.
“More and more people in Washington have decided to look for work,” said Karen Lee, the state employment commissioner. “With fuel prices and other costs rising, families are looking for ways to increase their income.”
Thompson said that was certainly the case in Snohomish County, where the labor force grew faster than the increase in jobs, boosting unemployment. About 3,340 people were added to the labor force in July, with about 2,000 of them finding work and the rest still looking, Thompson said.
She said the influx was likely a mix of new residents showing up to find work and old residents who had earlier given up a job search and were now renewing it.
Hiring people were Boeing and other aerospace firms, bars and restaurants, retail shops, health services, and government. Professional services and local schools cut back.
Construction, an important employment sector, remained flat in July with 21,700 workers. That’s down 3,900 jobs from a year ago, primarily because of cutbacks in home construction.
Thompson noted that job growth in the county rose by 1 percent in July in comparison with last year, the same amount as the state.
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