The Savannah metro area, which includes Chatham, Bryan and Effingham counties, saw its unemployment rate drop to 4.9 percent in November. This was its lowest level since May of 2008. It stood at 6.1 percent last November and 5.3 percent in October of 2015.

Initial unemployment insurance claims for Savannah dropped 3.9 percent, from 847 to 819. However, the number of unemployment insurance claims did rise 2.8 percent from October of 2015. Many of the new claims came from those working in administrative an support services.

Savannah was the only metro area in Georgia that had it’s unemployment claims go down from November of 2014 to November of 2015.

The Georgia Department of Labor also revealed that the Savannah metro area had a total of 173,900 non-farm payroll jobs in November. This was 2.4 percent increase from the 169,900 jobs in November 2014. The key finding is that the rate of jobs are increasing faster than the area’s population.

During the year, Savannah added 4,000 new jobs. Professional and business services led the way, gaining 2,400 jobs, followed by retail trade, transportation and warehousing. Manufacturers added 700 jobs. These additions offset the 1.6 percent decline in leisure and hospitality jobs. Government employment remained flat.

Metro Gainesville led Georgia with a jobless rate of 4.2 percent and the Heart of Georgia-Altamaha region suffered the highest at 6.8 percent.

Georgia’s overall seasonally-adjusted unemployment rate for November fell slightly from 5.7 percent to 5.6 percent. The rate was 6.7 percent in November of 2014. Over the year, Georgia gained  93,000, which is a 2.2 percent job increase, besting the national average.

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