Ohio’s jobs comeback from the pandemic stalled in April, leaving the state a long way from recovering the jobs that were lost a year after the coronavirus shut down the economy.
The state’s unemployment rate held steady at 4.7% in April as employers cut 3,700 jobs over the month, the Ohio Department of Job and Family Services said Friday. The number of unemployed workers rose by 2,000 to 273,000.
Over the past year, the state has added 586,900 jobs.
In normal times, those would be especially strong job numbers, but in March and April of 2020, the state lost nearly 900,000 jobs. Strong job gains last summer have faded over the last several months. Job growth has been flat since January.
It’s a similar story nationally with the U.S. needing 8.2 million jobs to get back to where it was before the coronavirus struck, federal employment data show.
Employers have complained that they are struggling to find workers to fill openings across a spectrum of industries.
In response, Gov. Mike DeWine has said the state will end the extra $300-a-week supplemental federal unemployment benefits starting June 26.
Nationwide senior economist Ben Ayers said the weak jobs numbers last month reflect the difficulty that employers are having finding workers.
“Job gains should accelerate in coming months as consumer activity surges post-pandemic, especially among the services industries that were hardest hit over the past year,” he said in a research note.
Economist Bill LaFayette, owner of economic consulting firm Regionomics, said he, too, expects job growth to pick up this summer as long as there isn’t another spike in coronavirus cases.
But it will take time, he said, noting the damage the coronavirus has done to the state and national economies.
“It’s the strain on the economy of trying to reopen something that was basically shut down and allowed to cool off,” he said of the slow job growth. “It’s like starting up a car engine in January.’’
The unemployment rate in Ohio has fallen sharply over the past year after hitting 16.4% in April 2020.
By comparison, the U.S. unemployment rate for April was 6.1%, down from 14.8% in April 2020.
The unemployment rate in Ohio was steady at 4.7 percent for April.
Ayers said the low unemployment rate does reflect that many workers remain out of the labor force for a variety of reasons.
“Positively, the labor force did see a solid increase in April and should climb further in coming months as workers see more job opportunities with economic activity expected to accelerate,” he said.
LaFayette said he expects people to get back into the labor force as vaccinations continue to rise and people become more comfortable leaving their homes.
“There are certainly people who would like to starting working again but just can’t because of their own personal obligations (like child care),” he said.
The hard-hit leisure and hospitality sector lost 3,900 jobs during April, more than any other sector, while the private education and healthcare sector added the most jobs, 1,900 jobs. Most of the other sectors showed small gains or losses.
@BizMarkWilliams
