WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. — Today, Governor Rick Scott announced that the West Palm Beach area added 14,300 new private-sector jobs in the last year. The area’s unemployment rate dropped to 4.4 percent in August, down 0.9 percentage point in the last year. Statewide, Florida businesses created 22,100 new jobs in August and the unemployment rate dropped to 4.0 percent, the lowest rate since June 2007. Since December 2010, Florida businesses have created 1,441,000 new private-sector jobs.

The industries with the highest growth over the year in West Palm Beach were education and health services with 4,300 new jobs; leisure and hospitality with 3,700 new jobs; and construction with 3,500 new jobs. In August, the West Palm Beach area had 16,194 job openings and offered 4,581 openings for high-skill, high-wage STEM jobs.

Florida’s annual job growth rate of 2.9 percent exceeds the nation’s rate of 1.7 percent, continuing the 65-month trend of our state’s rate being higher than the nation’s. In August, 23,936 Floridians were placed in jobs by CareerSource Palm Beach County and the state’s other 23 local workforce boards. 

To view the August 2017 employment data visit www.floridajobs.org/labor-market-information/labor-market-information-press-releases/monthly-press-releases.

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