Media Contact: Laura Byrnes, APR, CPRC
Communications Manager
Direct: 352.291.9559 Mobile: 352.816.1264
[email protected]

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

OCALA MSA POSTS THIRD FASTEST JOB GROWTH RATE IN OTHER SERVICES

OCALA, Fla. (Jan. 18, 2018) – The jobless rate in the CareerSource Citrus Levy Marion dropped slightly to 4.5 percent in December 2017. This number is down 1.3 percentage points from December 2016’s unemployment rate of 5.8 percent.

Numbers released today from the Florida Department of Economic Opportunity show that the labor force was also down 888 jobs over the year.  There were 8,885 unemployed residents in the region – an expected decrease over 9,151 in November 2017.

Levy County continued to hold the lowest employment rate in the three-county region, with a jobless rate of just 3.9 percent, followed by Marion County at 4.3 percent and Citrus County at 5.4 percent.

Additionally, the Ocala MSA had the third fastest annual job growth rate compared to all the metro areas in the state in the other services sector (6.5 percent) in December 2017. Both the manufacturing and education and health services sectors also saw growth faster than the rest of the state in December 2017.

In December, nonfarm employment in the Ocala metropolitan statistical area was 105,100, an increase of 900 jobs (0.9 percent) during the year.

The region’s employment summary for January will be released on March 12.

For additional information about December’s numbers, visit http://lmsresources.labormarketinfo.com/library/releases/arearelease_region10.pdf.