Douglas County Economic Indicators - December 2022
Douglas County employment grew by 1%, or 270 jobs, from November 2021 to November 2022, led by growth in health care and tribal government. The seasonally adjusted unemployment rate was 5.3%.
I hope 2023 has exciting things in store for all of us. The graph this month looked at job demand over 2022 in comparison with 2021.
Job demand was lower this year than last for most occupations, which isn’t necessarily terrible news. It probably reflects Douglas County’s relatively slow rebound and small job losses from the COVID recession. In the context of previous recessions, recovery has been remarkably fast although overall employment still lags from where it was pre-COVID.
Judging by online job ads, there was the steepest dropoff in demand for medical and health services managers, truck drivers and customer service representatives. In all these cases there was still substantial demand in 2022 – they were among the top 10 most demanded jobs, after all – but the pace of demand slackened somewhat from 2021.
This month’s articles included:
Unwrapping Holiday Hiring on Quality Info
Oregon Construction Employment at Record Highs on Quality Info
Racial and Ethnic Economic Disparities in Oregon, an Update on Oregon Office of Economic Analysis blog
As always, the Indicators contain all the latest economic data on our area. If you have a data question or want to learn more about any of these topics, please don’t hesitate to reach out.
Henry L. Fields
Workforce Analyst/Economist
Serving Lane and Douglas counties
Oregon Employment Department
(541) 359-9178
