FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. — Today, Governor Rick Scott announced that the Fort Lauderdale area added 12,400 new private-sector jobs in the last year, continuing to be among the top five Florida metro areas for private-sector job growth. Fort Lauderdale’s unemployment rate was a low 3.2 percent in April, down 0.5 percentage point from one year ago. Statewide, Florida businesses created 8,300 new jobs in April bringing the total number of new private-sector jobs created in Florida to more than 1.5 million since December 2010.

The industries with the highest growth over the year in Fort Lauderdale were construction with 3,400 new jobs and professional and business services with 3,100 new jobs. Fort Lauderdale remains among the top four metro areas in online job demand in Florida with 23,070 openings in April. Also, the area had the fourth-highest number of openings for high-skill, high-wage STEM occupations with 5,684 job ads.

As of April, Florida’s unemployment rate remains low at 3.9 percent, a drop of 6.9 percentage points since December 2010; this drop is faster than the national decline of 5.4 percentage points. In the last year, 125,000 people entered Florida’s labor force, a growth of 1.2 percent, which is greater than the national labor force growth rate of only 0.8 percent.

To view the April 2018 employment data visit www.floridajobs.org/labor-market-information/labor-market-information-press-releases/monthly-press-releases.

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