PROVIDENCE – Employment in Providence County fell 4.9 percent in the year ended last June, the U.S. Labor Department said Wednesday.
The total number of jobs at the 17,700 establishments in Rhode Island’s largest county fell to 269,210 in the 12-month period, the government reported.
The county’s percentage change in jobs ranked No. 160 out of the 334 largest counties in the U.S., meaning a bit more than half of the nation’s counties lost more jobs than Providence did.
The Labor Department also said the total number of jobs in Providence County was 7.7 percent lower last June than it was in the same month of 2001, as employment fell to 269,210 from 291,674 eight years earlier.
Nationwide, employment declined from June 2008 to June 2009 in all but 10 of the 334 largest counties as the nation’s payrolls shrank 5.1 percent. The largest drop was in Elkhart County, Ind., located about 100 miles southeast of Chicago, where employment plunged 22 percent.
The average wage in Providence County rose 1 percent to $833 per week in the year ended last June. The percentage change in wages ranked No. 101 out of 334, meaning wages grew by more here than in 70 percent of large U.S. counties.
Nationally, the nation’s average weekly wage fell 0.1 percent in the year ended last June, the second consecutive year-over-year decline and one of only four declines in three decades of records.
