EVERETT — Snohomish County’s unemployment rate dropped to 3.6 percent, the lowest it has been since August 2007, according to numbers released Tuesday by the Employment Security Department.
Almost all industries experienced job gains, said Anneliese Vance-Sherman, a regional labor economist based in Everett.
“Overall what we’re seeing is the unemployment rate is going down for all the right reasons in Snohomish County,” Vance-Sherman said.
Snohomish and King counties are the only counties in the state to drop below 4 percent. King County came in at a 3.3 unemployment rate. Most of the state’s counties had unemployment rates at 5 percent or higher. Pierce and Skagit counties each had an unemployment rate of 6.2 percent.
Snohomish and King counties are benefiting from the momentum of a diverse urban economy, Vance-Sherman said. During the recovery, Snohomish and King counties led the way with lower unemployment rates. And much of that could be attributed to strong job gains in aerospace.
Other industries are now adding jobs, she said.
The unemployment rate typically improves each March and April, Vance-Sherman said. It’s likely the unemployment rate will increase in the next few months as students seek summer jobs and more and more long-term unemployed look to get back into the job market.
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