NYC Unemployment Rate Falls To 5.7 Percent
NEW YORK (CBSNewYork/AP) -- New York City's unemployment rate has fallen to 5.7 percent, the lowest it's been in seven years.
The New York State Department of Labor announced Friday that the city had added 107,800 private sector jobs in the last year.
That's an increase of 3 percent while the national growth rate was 2.4 percent.
Nearly 10,000 of those jobs were added from June to July, sending the unemployment rate falling from 6.1 percent.
"It's the greatest decline in New York City's history," Deputy Mayor for Economic Development Alicia Glen told WCBS 880's Rich Lamb. "It's just extraordinarily good news for New Yorkers."
Glen said wages are also starting to rise.
"Wages are rising for the first time since the beginning of the recovery," Glen said. "We're seeing average wages since the de Blasio administration has been in office up over 4 percent and we're seeing that trend continue to grow."
To critics who call Mayor Bill de Blasio anti-business, his administration counters that the private sector has added 177,000 jobs since his honor took office in January 2014, Lamb reported.
The city will continue to invest in sectors where there is high jobs growth specifically health care, financial services, technology and media, Glen said.
The mayor has recently touted the job numbers as means to push back against the idea that quality of life in the city has deteriorated under his watch.
The national unemployment rate is 5.3 percent.
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