Wisconsin's local unemployment rates are generally higher than the previous month, but lower than one year ago.
According to newly released state figures, all 12 Wisconsin metro areas saw their seasonally unadjusted jobless rates go up from May to June -- but all 12 rates were lower than the previous June.
State Labor Economist Scott Hodek says more people are working here...
"....in your listening area for the most part we've seen labor forces rising. There are some counties where it didn't change much at all...Forest and Langlade. In general the number of employed has gone up, the number of unemployed has gone down and the rates in the listening area have also dropped over the year...."
Hodek says the experts he's talked to are finding there are more available jobs...
".....if your reasonably capable of working you can get a job pretty easily. We don't have a labor force that is growing very quickly and we have an economy that is growing so as we keep adding positions. If you're a business it's getting harder and harder to fill these positions sometimes...."
Iron county has the state's second-highest jobless rate at 7.9 percent, Forest county is fourth highest at 6.4 percent, Langlade seventh highest at 5.8 percent, followed by Vilas at 5.1 percent, Oneida 4.7 percent, Lincoln 4.6 percent and Price at 4.4 percent.
Only four of Wisconsin's 72 counties had higher unemployment this June than last, and all were in the northwest quarter of the state.
