Total unemployment for the eight-county Western Iowa Advantage region decreased from 38,400 in January of 2016 to 37,134 in January of 2017, down from 4.5 to 4 percent. Iowa Workforce Development reports that Iowa’s unemployment rate was also down from the previous year from 3.5 percent to 3.3 percent. Locally, Carroll and Greene Counties are seeing very low unemployment rates with Carroll at 2.7 and Greene at 2.8 percent. They are followed closely by Ida County posting 3.3 percent unemployment, then the numbers jump into the low to mid fours, with Adair and Guthrie at 4.2, Sac at 4.3 and Audubon reporting 4.4 percent rates. The highest unemployment rate in the region continues to be Crawford County at 6.1 percent.
