Connecticut’s unemployment rate jumped nearly 1 full percentage point in December, a sign that the state’s economy is still struggling.
The state shed about 4,800 jobs last month, causing the unemployment rate to jump to 8.9 percent, up from 8.2 percent in November, according to a report issued this afternoon by the state Department of Labor.
Overall Connecticut has shed nearly 95,000 jobs since the start of the recession, and economists expect that number to grow over 100,000.
“While job losses continue to hamper the growth of Connecticut’s economy, we still see a few bright spots that indicate the state is beginning to experience some slow but positive improvement,” said Salvatore DiPillo, the labor statistics supervisor for the DOL. “The state’s unemployment rate continues to remain below the national rate of 10 percent, and the number of initial unemployment claims decreased by more than 700 from November to December – a decline of nearly 10 percent from last year.”
But despite some of those positive signs, only two major sectors have shown growth in the state over the past year, and “it appears significant job growth across the board is slow to arrive for Connecticut and the nation as a whole,” DiPillo said.
In December, the one sector to add jobs was educational and health services, which boosted employment by 1,300 workers.
All other sectors remained unchanged or lost jobs. The biggest employment decline was found in trade, transportation and utilities, which shed 1,900 jobs in December with most of this in retail businesses, the labor department said.
