The Knox County unemployment rate improved from March to April and is more than 8 points lower than it was last year, but those numbers still exceed what the unemployment was before the pandemic.
According to data released by the Illinois Department of Employment Security yesterday, the county had an unemployment rate of 6.7 for April. That’s a 0.8 percent improvement from March.
In the month, about 320 more people were employed, bringing the total number of employed in the county to 18,805. Meanwhile, 1,343 remain unemployed.
The unemployment rate in Knox County spiked last year at 14.9 percent, right as the lockdowns were going into place and jobs were being cut.
Unemployment rate improvements have been seen throughout the area. The lowest unemployment in the area is Henderson County with 4.2 percent. Warren County was 4.5, Fulton County was 5.9. Henry County was 5.3 percent while McDonough County’s was 5. Mercer County’s unemployment rate was 5.4. Stark County’s was 5.8 and Peoria County was the highest of the area at 7.9 percent.
While the unemployment rate in Galesburg is not what it was before the COVID pandemic businesses throughout the world, the unemployment figures continue to improve.
The unemployment rate in Galesburg for the month of April was 7.3 percent. An improvement of nearly a full percentage point from last month and over half of what it was in 2020 for the same month.
The IDES says that Galesburg had 10,468 people as part of its labor force while 830 individuals were unemployed.
Looking at the City of Danville, which is comparable in many ways to Galesburg, things could be worse. Danville’s unemployment is 7.7 percent with 910 people out of work in April.
The City of Alton is another good comparison. With a labor force of 11,105, their unemployment rate was 8.5 percent, over a full percentage point worse.
