The Nebraska Department of Labor recently released statistics on Nebraska’s employment summary in May 2026. Month over month, this year has shown little change with predominantly positive trends overall.
Although slightly higher than May 2025’s 2.9%, May of 2026 showed Nebraska had 3% unemployment which remained unchanged from April of this year.
In May 2025, Nebraska’s total labor force was just over 1,097,000. This past May, that number rose by about 4300 laborers but did decrease by about 1200 compared to April’s report.
On the national stage, Nebraska is consistently among the best in regards to low unemployment. May’s results show that stayed true with Nebraska in a three-way tie for fifth with New Hampshire and Alabama also reporting 3% unemployment.
Nebraska is also 1.3% lower than the national average of 4.3%. South Dakota, Nebraska’s northern neighbor, reported the nation’s lowest unemployment rate at 2.1%. At the opposite end of the national rankings was the District of Columbia (Washington D.C.) reporting 6.1% unemployment–highest in the U.S.
