R.I. jobless rate ends 2016 at 5%, highest in New England

RHODE ISLAND ended 2016 with a unemployment rate of 5 percent, four-tenths of a percentage point lower than a year earlier, but still the highest jobless rate in New England, according to Bureau of Labor Statistics data.
RHODE ISLAND ended 2016 with a unemployment rate of 5 percent, four-tenths of a percentage point lower than a year earlier, but still the highest jobless rate in New England, according to Bureau of Labor Statistics data.

PROVIDENCE – Rhode Island’s unemployment rate fell to 5 percent in December, the fourth consecutive month-over-month decline. That’s according to information released Tuesday by the federal Bureau of Labor Statistics.

That figure is three-tenths of a percentage point lower than the state’s unemployment rate in November, which was 5.3 percent.

It is also lower than the unemployment rate in December 2015, which was 5.4 percent.

The BLS says 27,835 Rhode Islanders were unemployed in December, a 4.8 percent decrease from the number of unemployed residents in November. The number of employed Rhode Islanders decreased by less than 1 percent, from 555,612 in November to 553,301 in December.

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The national unemployment rate in December was little changed from November at 4.7 percent, but it was three-tenths of a percentage point lower than in December 2015.

Rhode Island lagged the rest of the region, with New Hampshire registering the nation’s lowest unemployment rate, 2.6 percent. Massachusetts tied for the second-lowest (with South Dakota), at 2.8 percent. Vermont posted a jobless rate of 3.1 percent, Maine 3.8 percent and Connecticut 4.4 percent.

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