November's Unemployment Snapshot
Readers' note: Since the county data is not seasonally adjusted (nsa), we use the not-seasonally-adjusted data for both the U.S. and Indiana statewide figures so that our readers can easily compare a county to the state or nation without confusion.
Indiana continues to experience lower-than-national rates of unemployment, with a rate of 4.7 for November 2002 compared to 5.7 for the nation. During the span of the past 14 years, the peak year for November unemployment was 1992 for both Indiana (6.1) and the U.S. (7.1).
Highs and Lows
Orange County had the highest unemployment rate (8.8) of the 92 counties.
This south-central county has a population of 19,442 (latest 2001 estimate),
ranking it 74th in the state. It depends on manufacturing, one of the
hardest hit sectors in both the U.S. and Indiana in terms of job losses
over the past two to three years.
Orange County is part of the new Commerce Region 12. That region had an IBRC-calculated unemployment rate of 4.6 for November 2002, ranking it seventh lowest among the 12 new regional configurations and slightly lower than the state's rate.
