After reviewing 2015 jobs data, the U.S. Bureau of Labor
Statistics has boosted Georgia by additional 27,600 new jobs in 2015. The total
brings the state’s job growth up to 118,700 for the last calendar year.
With the adjustment, Georgia’s nonfarm employment at the end
of 2015 stood at 4,330,100 jobs – a new record.
Georgia Nonfarm Employment, Jan. 1990 - Jan. 2016, Seasonally Adjusted
The increase means that Georgia’s job growth rate rose from
a preliminary figure of 2.2 percent to a final figure of 2.8 percent placing
Georgia with the 3rd highest job growth rate among large states in
2015. In 2014, the state recorded a 3.4 percent growth rate.
Only Florida, which grew by 3.2 percent, and California,
which grew by 3.1 percent, showed better percentage gains in new jobs among the
nation’s 11 largest states.
While impressive, the state’s job growth in 2015 was its
second best in this century, still falling short of its 2014 level when Georgia
added 137,600 new jobs. Prior to 2014, the last time the state experienced this
level of growth was in 1999 when it added 122,400 jobs over the calendar year.
Georgia ended the calendar year with an unemployment rate of
5.5 percent, its lowest unemployment rate for a calendar year since 2007. Over
the year, the state’s labor force grew by 38,037 as 80,479 more people found
employment and the number of unemployed dropped by 42,442.
Even as the state’s unemployment rate has dropped from
double digits during the most recent recession to single digit numbers, Georgia’s
labor force has shown little change, a situation that is showing up in labor
numbers across the nation. Economists are unsure of the reason for the slow
growth of the labor force although some attribute it to an increasing number of
retirees as baby boomers retire.
Atlanta Metro Area
The Atlanta area continues to be the state’s main growth
engine adding 70,400 jobs in 2015. The metro area’s rate of job growth did slow
in 2015, equaling the state’s job growth rate of 2.8 percent but slower than
the growth rates recorded for the metro area in 2014 (4.2 percent) and 2013
(3.2 percent).
As of the end of calendar year 2015, the Atlanta metro area
was base for 2,622,600 jobs, more than 60 percent of the state’s total nonfarm
employment.
Over the calendar year, the metro area accounted for 59
percent of the state’s new jobs.
Each spring, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics’ nonfarm
payroll estimates for states and metropolitan areas are revised as a result of
annual benchmark processing to reflect 2015 employment counts primarily from
the BLS Quarterly Census of Employment and Wages. These changes are reflected in this release.