City’s unemployment numbers down in March

The city of Maricopa witnessed its unemployment rate drop from 13.5 percent in February to 12.9 percent in March, according to numbers released by the Arizona Department of Commerce last week.

Each month the state looks at each city’s workforce size and compares the number of those who have collected or applied for unemployment benefits to determine the city’s unemployment percentage.

From February to March, the city saw the number of those employed decrease from 17,620 to 17,704 and those collecting unemployment decrease from 2,770 to 2,628. The total size of the workforce shrunk from 20,474 to 20,442.

The decrease in employment comes after two months of holding consistent at 13.5 percent. Maricopa was not alone in its dwindling unemployment numbers. Pinal County, as a whole, fell from 12.2 percent to 11.6, and the entire state saw its month-to-month numbers drop from 9.8 to 9.4 percent.

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