{"id":153526,"date":"2025-09-19T03:58:06","date_gmt":"2025-09-19T03:58:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/153526\/"},"modified":"2025-09-19T03:58:06","modified_gmt":"2025-09-19T03:58:06","slug":"state-jobless-rate-edges-down-in-august-as-people-exit-workforce","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/153526\/","title":{"rendered":"State jobless rate edges down in August as people exit workforce"},"content":{"rendered":"

Michigan\u2019s monthly unemployment rate dropped slightly by a tenth of a percentage point from July<\/a> to 5.2% in August. The monthly jobs report<\/a> from the Michigan Department of Technology, Management, and Budget released Thursday indicated that the dip was less because of an increase in people finding jobs, and more because of people exiting the workforce.<\/p>\n

The report said that while the number of payroll jobs remained steady, the unemployment percentage was affected by about 14,000 fewer people holding or seeking jobs. This is the fifth consecutive month the state\u2019s workforce has shrunk.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhile the number of unemployed people are decreasing, the number of employed is not going up,\u201d said Michigan Labor Market Information Director Wayne Rourke. \u201cSo, these people are just leaving the labor market and not looking for a job.\u201d<\/p>\n

Some reasons for that include people aging out of the workforce, jobseekers getting discouraged and the high childcare costs that are keeping people at home.<\/p>\n

Rourke said Michigan\u2019s workforce participation has been slowly declining for a while.<\/p>\n

\u201cI can tell you this five-month-in-a-row drop in labor force and the magnitude is pretty significant looking at history,\u201d he said. \u201cIt\u2019s larger than what we typically see. So, it\u2019s a trend that we\u2019re keeping an eye on, for sure.\u201d<\/p>\n

University of Michigan economist Gabriel Ehrlich said the jobs news demonstrates the complexity of the state\u2019s economic picture right now.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m going to be honest with you \u2013 this month\u2019s jobs report is a head-scratcher,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cSeeing a substantial decline in the labor force can be discouraging news,\u201d he told Michigan Public Radio. \u201cIt can be a little bit of a sign for concern and so it is good to see the unemployment rate falling, but the underlying reason isn\u2019t as positive as we would hope.\u201d<\/p>\n

Thursday\u2019s jobs report is an early snapshot of the state of employment and the economy in Michigan. It will be rounded out in future weeks and months with more state and federal data.<\/p>\n

The U.S. Labor Department\u2019s national jobs report released earlier this month<\/a> showed employment growth lagged behind expectations. The revised June report showed the nation lost jobs for the first time in five years.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Michigan\u2019s monthly unemployment rate dropped slightly by a tenth of a percentage point from July to 5.2% in…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":153527,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[64,63,99,180],"class_list":{"0":"post-153526","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-jobs","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-business","11":"tag-jobs"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/153526","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=153526"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/153526\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/153527"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=153526"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=153526"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=153526"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}