July 26, 2023 3:50 a.m.

Douglas County’s seasonally adjusted unemployment rate dropped to 4.8 percent in June compared with a revised 5.0 percent in May. The rate is down from 4.9 percent in June 2022.

An update from the State of Oregon Employment Department said Douglas County’s record low unemployment rate was set in November 2019 at 4.3 percent. The Oregon seasonally adjusted June rate was 3.5 percent and the U.S. rate was 3.6 percent.

Regional Economist Brian Rooney said Douglas County payroll employment decreased a seasonally adjusted ten jobs in June after an increase of one hundred ninety in May and a loss of ninety in April. Rooney said the county has gained back seventy-eight percent of the jobs lost in March and April 2020 at the onset of the COVID-19 crisis.

OED said in the not seasonally adjusted private-sector industries in June, there were seasonal gains of one hundred in leisure and hospitality and seventy in construction. There were additional gains of forty in professional and business services. There were losses of twenty each in wood product manufacturing, and in transportation, warehousing and utilities.

Rooney said government gained thirty jobs from gains of forty in federal government and ten in state government that were countered by a loss of twenty in local government.

When comparing June 2023 with June 202, total nonfarm employment decreased by seventy jobs, or 0.2 percent. Private-sector over-the-year gains of one hundred eighty were seen in leisure and hospitality, one hundred in the over services category and ninety in the private education and health services category. There were relatively large losses of two hundred forty in professional and business services, of one hundred sixty in manufacturing and of fifty in retail trade.

OED said government gained ninety jobs over the year from gains of one hundred ten in local government and ten in state government that were countered by a loss of thirty in federal government.