Flagler County's Labor Force Approaches Record Again as Workers Jump Back, or Move, In

may unemployment rate — Click on the graph for larger view. (© FlaglerLive)

It isn’t there yet, but Flagler County’s labor force, which gained nearly 650 people in May, is approaching its record high of 49,165, set in March 2020, just as the coronavirus pandemic was beginning to cascade over the country and the state. It was at 48,233 in May.

The labor force total, released as part of this morning’s jobless report for May in Flagler and Florida, is an indication of economic and demographic dynamics. It reflects both the number of people willing or needing to rejoin the labor force as well as ne entrants to the labor force in the county, such as graduating students or people relocating to Flagler. The county has been experiencing brisk development, with single-family homes and duplex permit applications hitting a 16-year high in March, with 282 (the previous high was September 2005, at 283), and staying high the next two months, at 243 and 244.

The unemployment rate in May in Flagler fell to 5.1 percent, from 5.3 percent in April, job-holders grew by 745. That’s Flagler County residents holding part-time or full-time jobs anywhere in the county or elsewhere, and with part0time work being as few as an hour in the reporting period. A job gain that steep would have normally lowered the unemployment rate more significantly. But because the labor force grew apace, the rate stayed almost flat, as it has since last October, with only small fluctuations one way or the other. But the total number of people employed in Flagler is also approaching the record, set in February 2020, when it reached 46,560. The county is just under 800 jobs short of that, and will likely break the record sometime this year.

The number of unemployed Flagler residents fell to 2,441, from 2,544.

In Florida, the unemployment rate for May ticked up to 4.9 percent even as the state added nearly 40,000 jobs–again, because the labor force grew by more than 100,000.

“What is also really important is that people are coming back into the labor force,” Adrienne Johnston, the state labor department’s chief economist, said in a conference call with reporters. “It could cause the unemployment rate to continue to increase for a little while. But that’s not necessarily a bad thing. The most important thing is that people are encouraged to come back into the labor force.”

The number of unemployed also grew, from 488,000 in April to just over half a million in May, though the figure is almost 1 million lower than where it was in May 2020, when the economy was struggling out of lockdowns. Last month all 24 metro areas in the state had over-the-year job gains, led by
Orlando-Kissimmee-Sanford (+109,700 jobs, or 10.1 percent).

But there were no significant job gains (or losses) by sector. The largest gain was a 1.5 percent increase in arts, entertainment and recreation jobs (2,600 jobs), with leisure and hospitality, the hardest-hit sector since the pandemic, adding 9,200 jobs overall, an increase of almost 1 percent.