Cherokee Jobless Rate Falls to 7.7%

Cherokee County passed a milestone in November: More than 100,000 county residents have jobs.

An additional 980 Cherokee residents were working at the end of November compared with the end of October, according to preliminary figures the Georgia Department of Labor released Thursday.

That means 100,380 of the 108,770 people in the county’s workforce are employed.

It also means the county’s unemployment rate fell to 7.7 percent in November from and and from 8.8 percent in November 2010.

Are you more optimistic about the economy as employment grows?

Cherokee County’s good job news matched the improvement for the official metro Atlanta area, where the November rate was 9.2 percent, down from 9.9 percent in October and 10.2 percent in September and 10.3 percent in November 2010. That area covers Barrow, Bartow, Butts, Carroll, Cherokee, Clayton, Cobb, Coweta, Dawson, DeKalb, Douglas, Fayette, Forsyth, Fulton, Gwinnett, Haralson, Heard, Henry, Jasper, Lamar, Meriwether, Newton, Paulding, Pickens, Pike, Rockdale, Spalding and Walton counties.

In the smaller area covered by the Atlanta Regional Commission—Cherokee, Clayton, Cobb, DeKalb, Douglas, Fayette, Fulton, Gwinnett, Henry and Rockdale counties—the jobless pattern was the same: 9.1 percent in November, down from 9.8 percent a month earlier and 10.2 percent a year ago.

Cherokee’s rate remains lower than the state rate—a seasonally adjusted 9.9 percent in November, down from 10.2 percent in October and 10.4 percent in November 2010—and the seasonally adjusted national rate of 8.6 percent in November. The national rate was 9 percent in October and 9.8 percent in November 2010.

The Atlanta metro area added 13,300 jobs in November, the Labor Department said. Most of those jobs were in private service-related industries, including professional and business services, trade, transportation, warehousing, education, health care and financial services.