January 2020 Employment Report

January 2020 Miami-Dade County Jobs Data

Presented by:

NOTE FROM THE MIAMI-DADE BEACON COUNCIL:

In order to effectively re-calibrate the previous year’s data and establish benchmarks, January Unemployment Rates are reported in March (instead of February). The February 2020 data will be released later this month, with March 2020 employment data reported in April; that returns us to the standard one-month delay given all reporting is backward-looking.

While standard practice, we wanted to call attention to the timing for this report given the present economic climate. As the data focuses on January 2020 (and its comparison to the prior year), the analysis does not reflect the economic realities the world now finds itself in due to the Coronavirus (COVID-19). While we are proud of the record-breaking unemployment numbers reported for January 2020, we know that the reality of Miami-Dade County’s present economic climate in the wake of this global pandemic will likely drive very different results in the weeks to come. This report does not speak to those challenges, but rather recognizes a second month of historically low unemployment – something our community will work to re-establish as we work together to mitigate the long-term impact of COVID-19 on our businesses, workforce and local economy as a whole.

(Miami, Fl) March 17, 2020 – Miami-Dade County had the lowest unemployment rate in Florida in January 2020. The County created 10,900 new non-agricultural payroll jobs (not seasonally adjusted), from January 2019 to January 2020, a 0.9 percent increase.

The Numbers, Analyzed
The highest job creation occurred in Leisure and Hospitality (3,400), Education & Health Services (2,600), with most jobs created in the healthcare industry. Job creation also occurred in Transportation, Warehousing & Utilities (2,100), Professional & Business Services (1,800), Total Government (1,500), Information (1,200), and Construction (400), and Other Services (500). The graph below shows the payroll data since January 2018.

The unemployment rate of 1.5 percent compared to last year January was a 1.5 percentage point lower unemployment rate at 3.0 percent in January 2019. Compared to December 2019 there was a 0.1 percentage point decrease from the unemployment rate at 1.6 percent. Below the graph compares the unemployment rate for Miami-Dade County with that of the United States since December 2017. It shows that Miami-Dade County was tracking the unemployment rate of the United States at a slightly higher rate until November 2018. For the last thirteen months the United States had a higher unemployment rate than Miami-Dade County.

In January 2020, the seasonally adjusted unemployment rate for Miami-Dade County (taking seasonal fluctuations in the labor force into consideration) was 1.9 percent, which is 1.0 percentage point lower than in January 2019.

From the data and analysis above, we see continued improvement in the local economy. Nevertheless, the community needs to remain focused on job creation projects in targeted industries. These industries have been identified as the industries most able to create additional well-paying job opportunities in Miami-Dade County, leading to an improved quality of life for Miami-Dade County residents. The Miami-Dade Beacon Council continues to aggressively work on attracting new companies to our community and work on the expansion and retention of existing business. For more information, visit www.beaconcouncil.com.

The job creation numbers are derived from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics Current Employment Statistics Program (CES), and only account for non-farm payroll jobs. However, the unemployment rates are derived from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics Local Area Unemployment Statistics Program (LAUS), which includes farm payroll jobs as well as self-employed workers.

In addition, the federal government typically conducts interviews in sample households to determine the unemployment rate. Miami-Dade County is one of six metropolitan areas in the United States that uses a different method solely based on a statistical model derived from several data sets.