MANATEE -- The jobs picture in Manatee County and statewide improved in December, spurred by holiday and seasonal hiring, according to data released by the state Friday.
Unemployment in Manatee for December dropped by almost a percentage point from November, from 12.6 percent to 11.8 percent. December’s rate also was lower than December 2009’s rate of 12.6 percent. The current rate translates into 17,100 unemployed workers.
Of Florida’s 67 counties, 65 recorded lower unemployment rates due to seasonal hiring in retail and agriculture, said Rebecca Rust, chief economist with the state’s Department of Workforce Innovation.
The state’s seasonally adjusted unemployment rate for December was 12 percent, unchanged from November.
Sarasota County had an 11.4 percent unemployment rate for December, also a drop from November’s 12.2 percent.
Rust said the job numbers are improving, although slowly.
“Temporary help numbers are up, and employers do hire temps first before permanent employees, so that’s a good sign,” Rust said.
Four industries statewide that gained jobs in December included private education and health services (34,500), leisure and hospitality (33,900), trade, transportation and utilities, and other services which includes membership organizations.
The top loser was still construction with 20,200 jobs lost in December followed by finance (7,700), information (5,200), manufacturing (5,000), and government (3,200).
Although the numbers are up, if you calculate the people who have given up their job search or have taken temporary work because they can’t find full-time employment, the unemployment rate statewide then rises to 20 percent.
Chuck Annalore, of Bradenton, is one of the 20 percent.
After being out of work for more than a year after being laid off at Albertsons, he found a job as a bread delivery driver at Flowers Bakery in August -- only to lose it three months later when his bad credit wouldn’t allow him to lease or buy his truck.
“These good numbers they report are a lie,” he said. “If they told us the truth, everyone would be in a panic.”
Annalore was getting unemployment benefits.
But after his stint with Flowers, he no longer qualifies, he says, so now he is living on $200 a month in food stamps and the generosity of friends.
He shares a mobile home off Cortez Road with a friend, rides a bike to apply for jobs and spent his Christmas thinking of all those in the same situation.
“I know people living at home with their parents because they have nowhere else to go,” he said. “I talked to all my friends and they spent absolutely nothing on Christmas.”
He’s still applying for jobs, but because he has been out of work for so long and is a diabetic with heart problems, he thinks his job prospects are dim.
“Unless there is divine intervention,” he said.
Data show there are 1.1 million people seeking work with only 200,000 jobs available.
“We do know that longer spells of unemployment makes reemployment more difficult,” Rust said.
But she said recovery is on the way. After a number of months of job losses in the Tampa-St. Petersburg metropolitan area due to the housing downturn, job growth has increased two months in a row.
Rust projected that statewide unemployment would drop to 11 percent by the end of the year, but won’t reach the former low 6 percent unemployment rate of the early and mid-2000s until 2019.
