Unemployment in Rutherford County has fallen considerably during the past 12 months, according to data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.
A month-to-month comparison of the county’s unemployment rates during the current and most-recent 12-month periods shows that rates during the current period have averaged just over a percentage point lower than the corresponding months in the most recent period.
The chart compares monthly unadjusted employment rates for the most recent 12-month period for which data are available, December 2013 through November 2014, with corresponding rates from the preceding 12-month periods. The November 2014 figure is still preliminary. The figures were distilled from federal data via the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis.
The county’s unemployment rate has averaged 5.3 percent during the current 12-month period compared to 6.5 percent during the previous 12-month period. Rates for months in the current period have run between half a percentage point and two percentage points lower than their corresponding monthly rates in the previous period. The county’s rate shows an uptick in November 2014, but the figure is still lower than the comparable figure from the preceding November and also below the statewide November 2014 figure of 6.4 percent.
During both periods, the county’s unemployment rate tended to peak during the summer months. But Rutherford’s rates ran well below the statewide average unemployment figures during both periods, calculated at 6.9 percent in the current period and 8.3 percent in the previous period. Additionally, Rutherford tied with Wilson County for the second-lowest unemployment rate in the Nashville area.
Williamson County, Rutherford’s neighbor to the west, had the lowest unemployment rate in the region, 4.5 percent. Robertson County, north of Nashville, and Cheatham County, just across the Interstate 24 corridor along Robertson’s southern border, had the region’s highest unemployment rates, at 6.1 and 5.5, respectively. Every county in the region, though, fell below the Tennessee-wide median unemployment rate of 6.9 percent.