Tampa, Fla.-(Newsradio 970 WFLA)-Governor Rick Scott says the Tampa Bay area added 28,400 new private-sector jobs in the last year, creating the second-highest number of jobs among all Florida metro areas, making the total number of new private-sector jobs created here 243,800 since December 2010.
Tampa’s unemployment rate was 3.0 percent, down 0.6 percentage point from a year ago. Florida businesses created 23,000 new jobs in November bringing the total number of new private-sector jobs created in Florida to 1,673,500 since December 2010.
The Tampa area remained first among the state metro areas in job demand in November with 56,469 openings. The Tampa area also continues to rank first in the state in demand for high-skill, high-wage STEM occupations with 18,907 openings in November.
Florida’s unemployment rate of 3.3 percent represents a drop of 7.5 percentage points since December 2010; this drop is faster than the national decline of 5.6 percentage points. This is while 116,000 people entered Florida’s labor force, a growth of 1.1 percent in the past year. Florida’s annual job growth rate of 3.3 percent continues to exceed the nation’s rate of 1.9 percent.
Photo courtesy Gov. Rick Scott