March 25--Illinois' unemployment rate ticked up in February to 6.4 percent, even as the state added 18,100 jobs, according to a report Thursday from the Illinois Department of Employment Security.
The state's job growth continues to lag behind the nation's. The U.S. unemployment rate held steady last month at 4.9 percent.
The unemployment rate, which includes people who are out of work and looking for work, but not discouraged job seekers who have given up, is increasing primarily because more workers are entering the labor force and are not immediately able to find jobs, the state agency said.
The Illinois unemployment rate is up from 6.3 percent in January. It was 6 percent in February 2015.
Illinois now has more jobs than it did before the Great Recession, and manufacturing, an important industry for the region, added 3,500 jobs last month.
Most of the February job growth was in professional and business services, trade, transportation and utilities and leisure and hospitality. Construction and education and health services saw the largest declines.
The state last month revised a previously dismal report showing that Illinois ended 2015 with 3,000 fewer jobs than at the beginning of the year. According to the revisions, Illinois actually added 49,600 jobs last year.
Still, the growth is uneven, and much of the state is hurting. Though metro-level jobless data for February won't be released until next week, the unemployment rate increased year-over-year in January in every metro area tracked except for the Chicago-Naperville-Arlington Heights metro area. The Chicago metro area gained more than 53,000 jobs during that period, while Bloomington, Danville and the Quad Cities all lost jobs.
aelejalderuiz@tribpub.com
