Warren Posts Highest Jobless Rate in September

YOUNGSTOWN, Ohio – The Mahoning Valley’s two largest cities again posted the highest unemployment rates among Ohio cities in September, the Ohio Department of Job and Family Services reported Tuesday morning.

Warren had the highest unemployment rate of the Ohio cities ODJFS tracks, 7.2%, followed by Youngstown, with 7.0%. No other Ohio cities last month posted a rate higher than Athens’ 5.9%.

In August, the two cities tied for the highest unemployment rate in the state, 7.5%, and both posted identical 6.9% rates in September 2018.

Trumbull County reported the fifth-highest unemployment rate among Ohio’s 88 counties last month at 5.5%, down from 5.9% in August but up from 5.2% in September 2018. Mahoning County’s 5.7% unemployment rate was ninth highest in the state, down from 6.1% the month before but up from 5.4% in September 2018.

Columbiana County reported a 4.8% rate in September, up from 4.6% a year earlier but down a tenth of a percentage point from 4.9% in August.

The unemployment rate for the Youngstown-Warren metropolitan statistical area, which covers Mahoning and Trumbull counties in Ohio and Mercer County in Pennsylvania, was 5.5% in September, up from 5.2% a year earlier but down from 5.9% in August.

In the Ohio-only portion of the MSA, unemployment was 5.9% in September, up from 5.5% a year earlier but down from 6.2% in August.

Copyright 2024 The Business Journal, Youngstown, Ohio.