Unemployment drops slightly in Augusta County

While the U.S. unemployment rate remained steady at 9.7 percent in July, Virginia, along with the greater Augusta County area, saw rates slightly decline, according to the Virginia Employment Commission.

Augusta County had the region’s lowest unemployment rate at 6.3 percent, down from 6.9 percent in June. Staunton’s rate, meanwhile, dropped from 7.6 percent to 7.2 percent, while Waynesboro’s fell from 9 percent to 8.7 percent.

Virginia’s unemployment rate fell from 7.3 percent in June to 6.9 percent in July. Martinsville once again had the state’s highest unemployment rate at 22.1 percent, while Arlington had the lowest at 4.3 percent.

Virginia Employment Commission Chief Economist William Mezger said the reference week for the current unemployment rate was later than normal – July 12 to July 18 – meaning that high school and college students had either found work or stopped looking.

Also, summer plant furloughs, Mezger said, took place earlier that month, with workers on furlough back at work by mid-July.

Nine of the state’s 10 metropolitan areas saw unemployment rates drop, with the Danville area remaining the same at 12.7 percent.

Virginia residents drawing unemployment benefits declined slightly, from 101,000 in June to 99,000 in July.

Mezger said he did not expect much of a decline in unemployment rates next month. He said the labor force in August drops because of students quitting summer jobs to go back to school. Also, school systems are at their lowest levels of employment.

“The rate may go up a little bit in August, but then after that, usually September through December are pretty good months,” Mezger said. He expects to see the state’s unemployment rate below 7 percent at the end of the year.

Long-term, Mezger thinks the rate will improve, but unemployment likely will go up in the winter months.

He said the increase in hours worked in manufacturing along with the increase in new business start-ups offer “glimmers of hope” for a sustained reduction in the unemployment rate. 

“We seemed to have stopped going down, but we haven’t seen much improvement so far,” Mezger said.