Irma or not, Fort Myers at 3.5 percent unemployment

The unemployment rate in all three of Southwest Florida’s coastal counties came in under 4 percent in September, but Hurricane Irma did have an impact.

Lee County registered 3.5 percent unemployment for the month, the lowest it has been in more than 10 years. Collier and Charlotte each came in at 3.9 percent.

Before this April and May, when it fell to the mid-3 percents, Collier's rate hadn't been this low since May 2007.

Lee’s rate was 4.1 percent in August and 4.9 percent a year ago. Collier’s rate was 4.7 percent in August and 5.5 percent a year ago. Charlotte’s rate was 4.7 percent in August and 5.7 percent a year ago.

Inland counties also dropped significantly. Hendry County had the state’s highest rate at 8.6 percent; Glades was third highest in state at 5.3 percent. Hendry’s rate was 10.2 percent in August and 11.6 percent a year ago. Glades’ rate was 6.3 percent in August and 7.2 percent a year ago.

Rates around 4 percent and lower indicate full employment, which typically means upward pressure on wages as there is greater competition for workers.

The latest figures were reported Friday by the Florida Department of Economic Opportunity. In the report, one bullet point stood out: the Cape Coral-Fort Myers metro area led the way statewide in lost jobs over the year, when comparing September of this year with the prior September.

More:July jobless figures tell divergent stories of Lee, Collier, inland

More:Summer sees spike in Lee, Collier jobless numbers

Nonagricultural employment in the metro area was 248,600, a decrease of 6,800 jobs (down 2.7 percent). Many of those losses were in the leisure and hospitality industry and the sector that includes construction.

September tends to be the start of a prime hiring cycle for the region, which ramps up for season, when snowbirds and tourists swarm the market in search of warmer temperatures.

The comparison, however, is misleading given Hurricane Irma, which caused hiring to almost grind to a halt as employers and workers dealt with the storm’s approach and aftermath, including evacuations, power outages, flooding and property damage.

Despite what could be viewed as a bleak September-to-September comparison, “overall employment continued to rise,” noted Mike Jackson, with the Southwest Florida Workforce Development Board.

In Lee County, 313,466 were employed this September counting all jobs, including farm employment. That's up from 313,096 in August and 312,536 a year ago. The labor force decreased by 3,686 from a year ago.

“If anything, I’m surprised our total employment went up last month,” Jackson said. “It’s a good thing. We’re enjoying generally full employment in our region and the kinds of jobs we’re looking at going more year-round.”

Christopher Westley, director of FGCU’s Regional Economic Research Institute, said the latest data is “obviously hurricane-related” and “clearly a blip.”

“What it shows is a pretty significant drop in employment during the month in which we usually start to see it pick up as we get closer to season,” he said, referring to nonagricultural jobs. “When you look at the breakdown of industries, employment is down almost across the board. In economics terms, it’s called a shock.”

Westley said he will be monitoring how long it takes for employment activity to return to a more normal pattern. People still spend after a major storm hits, but it may be on new windows rather than something fun.

“So how quickly will we revert to it?” he wondered. “Ironically, what we could witness is something called the broken window fallacy, where the economy looks stronger only because people are devoting funds to restoring things to where they were before.”

Jim Wall, spokesman for CareerSource Southwest Florida, agreed “it will be interesting to see what happens next month, if it’s taking longer” for normalcy to return to the hiring landscape.

Jim McKenna, area director of human resources for South Seas Island Resort and The Inns of Sanibel, said fall isn’t typically a big hiring time for them.

“Are we hiring? Yes,” he said. “But we’re going to hit our real high needs at Christmas and into the new year and really peak in early February.”

Economists say it’s important to look at the bigger trend rather than relying too much on monthly data when evaluating what it means.

“Let’s not read too much into these numbers,” Westley said. “I strongly suspect these numbers are going to be adjusted over the next few months. A better reading for the state of our labor force is to look at August to August.”

A concern moving forward — hurricane or not — is how low the rates have gotten in the coastal counties, which likely will see even lower rates as season kicks into high gear.

“Right now, this particular month, we really can’t read as much into it because of Irma,” Westley said. “I would discount these numbers from that perspective. Much lower, though, and we’re in the realm of unsustainable economic growth.”

Florida’s seasonally adjusted unemployment rate was 3.8 percent in September, down 0.2 percentage point from the prior month and down 1.1 percentage points from a year ago.

In the United States, the seasonally adjusted unemployment rate was 4.2 percent in September, down 0.2 percentage point from the prior month and down 0.7 percentage point from a year ago.

Connect with this reporter: email clogan@news-press.com and follow on Twitter @caseylo