Unemployment dips

Utah's jobless rate dipped again in January, another sign of an economy with its pedal to the floor.

The Utah Department of Workforce Services reported Tuesday that the state's unemployment rate for January was 3.7 percent, down from December's unrevised 3.8 percent. The January 2006 rate was more than a full percentage point lower than the 4.9 percent rate of the same month a year ago.

Mark Knold, senior economist with the department, said the latest survey indicates that the state's economy is "very strong."

"I don't want to go so far as to say that it's as good as it gets, but it's a very strong rebound" from the recession earlier in the decade, Knold said. "We are one of the best-performing economies in the country, second maybe only to Nevada."

Total employment, the year-over change in the number of nonfarm wage and salaried jobs, was up 4.8 percent in January — reflecting a "strong revision upward" from the forecasted growth rates, the department reported. December's jobs growth was revised to 4.6 percent from 3.9 percent forecasted last month.

The number of new jobs, combined with sinking unemployment, is good and challenging, depending on one's circumstances, Knold said.

"It depends on which side of the fence you're on," he said. "If you're a worker, it's a good thing because it means that wages are going to go up.

"From a businessperson's point of view, you're working back to the tough stuff of the late 1990s, where you really had to push wages up to get workers, and even then it's no guarantee that you'll get what you're looking for, in either quantity or quality. That's the hard part, and it can have a retarding or slowing effect on the economy, even one that's going full-bore."

The professional and business services sector added the most jobs, at 11,700, the department reported. Construction followed with 9,000 jobs added during the year-over period. The trade, transportation and utilities sector also posted healthy growth, adding 8,200 new jobs, while education and health added 5,500 new jobs.

This year should be another good one for Utah, Knold said, if not quite as hot under the hood.

"I think it will moderate a little bit as we move into 2006, but you're still moving along at a good rate of speed," he said. "If you're going down the highway at 80 (miles per hour), and you kick it back to 75, you're still going along at a pretty good pace. It's just that the cops won't let you go above 80, and I don't know that the broader economy will let us keep going at our current pace."

The U.S. Labor Department reported earlier this month that the national jobless rate (seasonally adjusted) fell to 4.7 percent in January from 4.9 percent in December 2005. The U.S. economy added 193,000 new jobs during the year-over period.

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E-mail: jnii@desnews.com