Illinois Department of Employment Security released unemployment numbers for each county in Illinois.
Based on the report, the unemployment rate in Knox County went from 5.5% in June of 2016, to 5% for 2017.
Warren County saw the biggest unemployment rate drop for the area with 4.6% for this year, down from 5.3% for June of last year. Warren County also added the least amount of jobs – 86 with the exception of Stark County which added zero.
Fulton and Henry Counties each saw a half a percentage point drop compared to last year. Henry County sits at 5.1% for June 2017 compared to 5.6% in 2016. Fulton sits at 6.6% 10th highest unemployment rate in the state – down from 7.1% a year ago. Fulton County lost the most jobs at 205 – Knox county added the most jobs with 93. In June, Henry County had 144 leave the labor force – the most in the area.
Stark County added and lost the least amount of jobs – zero – but also saw only 29 people leave the workforce.
For surrounding metropolitan areas, Peoria saw a seven-tenths percentage drop from 6.2 to 5.5% and The Quad Cities saw a nine-tenths percentage drop from 5.4% for June 2016 to 4.5% for June 2017.
For other metro areas of Illinois – Bloomington saw the largest drop in unemployment at 4.4% – nine tenths of a percentage drop from 5.3% last year.
Overall for the state, Illinois’ southern-most county Alexander has the highest unemployment rate – 9.8%. Brown County sits with the lowest unemployment rate for the state – 2.8%
