Florida’s unemployment rate dropped to 3.3 percent in November, the lowest level it’s been in 12 years.
The state released employment figures on Friday. The unemployment rate was down from 3.4 percent in October. Florida remains below the national unemployment rate of 3.7 percent.
Florida has 335,000 jobless residents out of a workforce of nearly 10.3 million people. The state has added 241,600 jobs over the past year.
Monroe County had the lowest unemployment rate at 2.4 percent, followed by St. Johns and Okaloosa counties at 2.5 percent.
Gulf County had the highest unemployment rate at 8.4 percent, followed by Bay County at 6.1 percent and Franklin County at 5 percent. All three counties were affected by Hurricane Michael.
Gov. Rick Scott announced that the Tampa area added 28,400 new private-sector jobs in the last year, creating the second-highest number of jobs among all Florida metro areas, making the total number of new private-sector jobs created in the Tampa area 243,800 since December 2010.
Tampa’s unemployment rate was 3.0 percent, down 0.6 percentage point from one year ago.
Statewide, Florida businesses created 23,000 new jobs in November, bringing the total number of new private-sector jobs created in Florida to 1,673,500 since December 2010.
The industry with the highest growth over the year in the Tampa area was education and health services with 10,600 new jobs.
The Tampa area remained first among the state metro areas in job demand in November with 56,469 openings. The Tampa area also continues to rank first in the state in demand for high-skill, high-wage STEM occupations with 18,907 openings in November.
