(The Center Square) – More Kentuckians looked for work last month. That’s according to unemployment data released by the Kentucky Education and Labor Cabinet.
The November unemployment rate of 5.1% was up a tenth from October and up November 2023’s 4.3% . Kentucky’s jobless rate also exceeds the national figure of 4.2%, which also was up a tenth from October.
Figures from the Cabinet’s Kentucky Center for Statistics show nearly 2.1 million residents are in the workforce, up more than 4,700 from October. The number of people working grew by 2,384. That’s almost identical to the 2,380 people added to the unemployment roll.
In all, 105,471 Kentuckians are unemployed, according to KYSTATS.
“Both the number of people employed and the number of people in the labor force have increased steadily throughout the year,” said University of Kentucky’s Center for Business and Economic Research Director Mike Clark in a statement. “Workers are entering the labor force faster than they are getting jobs, which has caused the state’s unemployment rate to increase.”
The workforce data includes working-age individuals outside of the military who either hold a job or have been actively seeking one over the past month.
A second report that also dropped Thursday indicated Kentucky added 5,500 nonfarm jobs over the month. In the past year, the state has added 30,400 jobs outside of the agricultural sector, and that represents a 1.5% year-to-year increase.
The unemployment report also came out just a couple hours before Gov. Andy Beshear announced the state celebrated its fourth-best year in economic development. Beshear, a Democrat who just completed the first year of his second and final term, revealed that 170 companies picked Kentucky for either new business projects or to expand existing facilities. Those companies plan to invest nearly $7 billion in the state and create more than 9,400 new jobs, which pay an average of more than $26 an hour.
Beshear said the news about job growth makes it “a special time to be a Kentuckian” during his weekly press briefing on Thursday.
“Our economy is on fire,” he added. “We’re creating new, great jobs and jobs of the future, and Kentucky has become a premier destination for business. We’ve all wanted this for so long.”
The governor also touted that the top two economic development years took place during his first term. Republicans, who hold supermajorities in both chambers of the General Assembly, have countered that lawmakers’ tax-cutting policies have helped drive the state’s current job growth spurt. In some cases, they’ve needed to override the governor’s vetoes to enact those laws.
