The Cincinnati metropolitan area created more jobs in June, but the growth wasn’t enough to keep up with population trends, and it coincided with other negative factors.
The June numbers, released today by the
Ohio Department of Job and Family Services
, showed Cincinnati adding 3,300 more jobs between May and June. But the region only added 600 jobs in the past year, far short of the 3,000 it must add on an annual basis to match population growth.
As more people entered the job market, the amount of unemployed people looking for work rose month-over-month, while it slightly decreased in a year-to-year comparison.
Cincinnati’s seasonally unadjusted unemployment rate hit 7.4 percent in June, up from 6.8 percent in May and the same as the year before.
With seasonally unadjusted numbers, economists typically prefer looking at year-over-year trends to control for seasonal factors, such as increased summer hiring. Job numbers at the state and federal levels are normally seasonally adjusted, but local numbers aren’t.
The seasonally unadjusted unemployment rate for Ohio was 7.5 percent in June, up from 7.4 percent last year. The U.S. seasonally unadjusted unemployment rate was 7.8 percent, down from 8.4 percent.
Although the report was mixed for Cincinnati, the area has been getting good economic news lately. In June, local housing sales
increased
despite higher interest rates. In a July 22 segment, CNBC host Joe Kernen, a Western Hills native,declared
, “Cincinnati has successfully reinvented itself as a hub for innovation” and technology.
