The latest Illinois Department of Employment Security numbers make it look like things are getting slightly better in southeastern Illinois. The nine southeasternmost counties in the state including White, Hamilton, Gallatin, Wayne, Edwards, Wabash, Saline, Hardin, & Pope have an average unemployment rate for June of 11%. That’s down from the May average of 13.2%.
Wayne County has seen the most people go back to work in our region from May to June with a 5.1% drop from 15.7 to 10.6%. that’s still 6.1 percent higher than June of 2019 though when the rate was just 4.5%.
Hamilton County has the lowest unemployment percentage in our area in for June at 9.1%. That’s 3.8 points lower than May of 2020, but 5.6 points higher than June of 2019.
White County is right in between both with a June 2020 unemployment rate of 9.7%; that’s 2.2 points less than a month prior, but 6.3 points higher than the rate in June of 2019 when unemployment was at just 3.4%.
The June 2020 Unemployment rate for Illinois is 14.6. That’s .2 points less than May, but 10.5 points higher than the same time last year. The United States meanwhile is averaging an 11.2 unemployment rate for June, 1.8 points better than May of this year and 7.4 points worse than the 3.8 America enjoyed in June of 2019.
See the entire area stats below:
June 2020 May 2020 June 2019
Edwards County 9.3 13.0 3.6
Gallatin County 11.4 12.6 4.6
Hamilton County 9.1 12.9 3.5
Hardin County 13.6 11.6 7.0
Pope County 12.3 12.3 5.5
Saline County 13.8 15.9 5.2
Wabash County 9.8 13.6 3.9
Wayne County 10.6 15.7 4.5
White County 9.7 11.9 3.4
