The unemployment rate in Arkansas, which has hit the lowest level in recorded history, is likely to remain below 4 percent through 2020, Michael Pakko said Friday at the annual Little Rock Regional Economic Briefing. Based on quarterly averages, the state’s unemployment rate will be 3.6 percent this year, 3.7 percent in 2019 and 3.8 percent in 2020, Pakko, chief economist at the Arkansas Economic Development Institute at the University of Arkansas at Little Rock, told a crowd of more than 100 at the Clinton Presidential Center. Pakko expects Arkansas’ nonfarm payroll employment will increase 1.1 percent this year, 1.2 percent in 2019 and 1 percent in 2020. “That’s a pretty positive outlook,” Pakko said. “When we look at where the job growth is going to come from, it’s pretty broad-based.” That would include about 12,000 jobs in professional and business services and almost 7,000 in leisure and hospitality services. The total number of new jobs from the remainder of 2018 through 2020 is 31,000, Pakko said. “That’s a pace of 1 [percent] to 1.2 percent,” Pakko said. There has been a long-term decline in manufacturing employment both in the U.S. and Arkansas. “That’s partly due to globalization and trade issues, but has more to do with technology and efficiencies,” Pakko said. Thirty four of the state’s 75 counties had an increase in employment from 2010 to 2017, meaning employment decreased in 41 counties, Pakko said. “Those areas of the state that used to rely on small-scale manufacturing, those jobs… [Read full story]
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