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While, on the surface, labor market conditions appeared relatively low key
during March, the market continued to tighten as evidenced by the
number of jobseekers who opted to discontinue their search – a
movement countering the trend of prior years. During March, just
over 5,800 jobseekers exited the job market – a departure which,
in fact, helped to minimize the impact of monthly employment
declines on the statewide unemployment rolls.
While unemployment was little changed over-the-month, Maryland’s
businesses remained on shaky ground, visibly impacted by cutbacks in
consumer spending and business investment. According to Maryland’s
business establishment survey, the number of jobs on industry
payrolls, following seasonal adjustment, declined by 10,200
over-the-month. March’s job reduction, the largest decline for the
month since 1993, brings the year-to-date job loss to just over
21,000 jobs. Declines during March were broad-based, shared by each
of the major private sector industry groups with the exception of
education and health services. Long-term declines continued in
construction and the professional and business services sector,
which began to backslide in February, experienced yet another month
of curtailment. About eight out of every ten jobs lost during March
resulted from layoff activity reported in these two business
sectors.
The downturn in Maryland’s job market followed on the heels of
national reports which showed business payrolls falling by 633,000
jobs during March. Although it appears as if the economic clouds have fanned out in
Maryland over recent months, Maryland’s job market remains in
somewhat of a better place than that of the nation.
Significant erosion has occurred in the nation’s industrial
job base since last March, with a decline of 3.5% translating into a
loss of nearly 4.8 million jobs. In Maryland, while job loss has
escalated, the 2.2% rate of decline over the past year remains
considerably below that of the nation.
At the local level, unadjusted unemployment rates either declined or
held steady in all jurisdictions with the exception of Washington
County where an increase in the number of jobseekers caused
unemployment to rise by 0.5 percentage points over-the-month to 10.5
percent in March. Some of the largest unemployment declines were
reported in the Shore counties. Kent County’s rate dropped by 0.8
percentage points, Worcester’s by 0.7 percentage points and
Somerset’s by 0.6 percentage points. Even with these declines,
unemployment rates in these and all other jurisdictions across the
state remained well above year ago averages.
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