Tampa Bay Area Gains 30,000 Jobs Over the Year

On Monday, Governor Rick Scott of Florida announced that the Tampa Bay Area gained nearly 30,000 jobs over the past year.  This represents the third-highest number of jobs in all metro areas in the state compared to a year ago.  And, the unemployment rate in the Tampa metro area declined by 2 percentage points over the year.

Scott said, "Today's news of positive annual job growth and a declining unemployment rate is evidence that it's working for Florida families in the Tampa area."  Scott's office stated nine of the 10 major industry sectors gained jobs over the year in January 2014.  The industries with the largest gain in jobs over the year were in professional and business services with 10,000 new jobs, trade, transportation and utilities with 6,700 new jobs and education and health services with 5,500 new jobs.

University of Central Florida economist, Sean Snaith, director of UCF's Institute for Economic Competitiveness says, "It's shaping up to be a feel good movie.  The lead actor is solid payroll job growth across sectors and it's sidekick will be an unemployment rate increasingly difficult to bring down as a labor force growth is boosted by increased hiring by businesses."

In addition, Florida's statewide unemployment rate for January 2014 was 6.1 percent, the lowest unemployment rate in the state since June 2008.  Since December 2010, Florida has gained 503,500 private sector jobs.

Employment data for February 2014 will be released on March 28, 2014.

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