Webster County’s unemployment rate decreased one-tenth of a percentage point to 5 percent in February.
The county’s jobless rate went down from 5.1 percent in January but was up from 4.7 percent in February 2017.
Mississippi Department of Employment Security statistics from 1990 forward show the county’s highest unemployment rate for February came in 2003, when it reached 14.5 percent. The lowest rate for that period was in 1998, when it dropped to 4.7 percent.
The number of unemployed Webster Countians in February increased by 10 to 200. The labor force, which is made up of everyone who has a job or is looking for one, increased by 190 to 3,900.
The state’s seasonally unadjusted unemployment rate was 4.5 percent in February while the national average was 4.4 percent, also unadjusted. Rankin County posted the lowest unemployment rate for the month at 3.1 percent while Jefferson had the highest at 13.7 percent.
February jobless rates in adjoining counties:
• Calhoun, 4 percent.
• Grenada, 4 percent.
• Oktibbeha, 4 percent.
• Chickasaw, 4.4 percent.
• Choctaw, 5 percent.
• Montgomery, 5.1 percent.
• Clay, 5.6 percent.
