Â
Â
Unemployment in Westchester County rose by 1.2 percent in June compared to a year ago, as labor market conditions in New York state continued to deteriorate and the statewide unemployment rate in June reached its highest level since December 2004 despite a monthly gain in private-sector jobs, according to state Labor Department officials.
Yet the slumping economy has not halted the demand for information technology professionals by companies in Westchester. The county”™s IT job market remained “energetic and healthy” in the second quarter this year, according to Pace University analysts. Hiring patterns in the county”™s IT job sector could be a good signal for the industry, a Pace economist said.
Westchester”™s non-seasonally adjusted unemployment rate was 4.8 percent in June, up from 3.6 percent in June 2007 and 4.5 percent in May. Putnam County”™s June unemployment rate of 4.4 percent was up from 3.3 percent in June 2007 and 4.3 percent in May. RocklandCounty”™s June unemployment rate was 4.9 percent, compared to 3.8 percent in June 2007 and 4.7 percent in May.
New York state”™s unemployment rate, after seasonal adjustment, was 5.3 percent in June, up from 5.2 percent in May and 4.6 percent in June 2007. The U.S. rate was 5.5 percent in June, unchanged from May”™s level and up from 4.6 percent in June 2007.
The state”™s private-sector employment increased in June by 4,200, or 0.1 percent, to a seasonally adjusted total of 7,259,900 jobs, Labor Department officials reported. It was the first monthly increase in the state”™s seasonally adjusted private-sector job count since January.
The rate of over-the-year private-sector job growth, however, has slowed to less than half of what it was last year, from 1.5 percent in the first half of 2007 to 0.7 percent in the first half of 2008, said Peter A. Neenan, director of the Labor Department”™s Division of Research and Statistics.
Â
Â
The largest number of private-sector jobs was in educational and health services, with 33,400 added in one year since June 2007. About two-thirds of that increase was in health care and social assistance. The job count also increased over the year in government; leisure and hospitality; professional and business services; other services; information and natural resources and mining.
Manufacturing in the state registered the largest drop among declining industries, with 17,900 jobs lost since June 2007. Employment also decreased over the year in financial activities, construction and trade, transportation and utilities.
In the Putnam-Rockland-Westchester region, Labor Department officials said the number of nonfarm jobs in the region has increased by 2,500 or 0.4 percent since June 2007, and the number of private-sector jobs has increased by 2,000, also a 0.4 percent gain.
Job openings in information technology showed second-quarter growth in both WestchesterCounty and Manhattan and in seven of 11 commonly-used categories, according to the Pace/SkillPROOF IT Job Index Report. Westchester”™s IT job market grew by 44 percent from the first quarter. The overall IT growth in Manhattan was 1 percent, still a contrast to employment declines in other sectors.
In Westchester, seven job categories showed improvement in the second quarter: IT managers, computer scientists”™ research, computer programmers, software engineers systems, systems analysts, database administrators and network and data analysts. The software engineers applications market was one of three IT categories that declined, along with openings for network administrators and other specialists.
Pace University economist Farrokh Hormozi, who developed and calculates the quarterly IT job index, said demand for that last declining job category “runs counter to the rest of the IT job market. These are the ”˜general computer people.”™ When the market shows improvement, businesses seem to hire more specialists. As a result, the sharp drop in demand for these generalists ”“ which showed up in both the first and second quarters ”“ may not be a bad sign for the overall industry.”
