Unemployment in Maine has remained relatively consistent in recent months, holding steady at 3.2 percent in March. This is down from 3.8 percent at this same time last year.
Compared to the rest of the country, Maine is faring about a percentage point better, with nationwide unemployment coming in at 4.3 last month.
Similarly, unemployment in New England averaged at 4.4 percent in March.
Compared to a year ago, unemployment is down in all Maine counties by a figure of anywhere from 0.1 percent to 1 percent.
Labor force participation rates continued to trend downward in Maine, falling to 59.5 percent, slightly below the national average of 61.8 percent.
Mainers on average worked 33.3 hours per week in March with an hourly wage of $33.63, up 3.9 percent over this same time last year.
Construction and manufacturing employees were tied for the longest average work week at 37.5 hours, while leisure and hospitality jobs saw the shortest average work weeks.
This industry was also the lowest paid, at an hourly rate of $24.60. This, however, does represent a 4.5 percent year-over-year increase.
Professional and business service workers were the most highly paid per hour at a rate of $39.35, an increase of 5.7 percent over last year.
Four in Ten who can’t / won’t work is directly related to alcoholism and pot smoking .
Theres altogether too much of both in Maine .
Four in Ten who either can’t or won’t work is directly related to alcoholism and pot smoking .
There is altogether too much of both in Maine .
Amazing seeing the state drives real businesses away as fast as they can
The four in ten in Maine statistic of those who get away with not working is directly related to the too generous democrat rules allowing the non working to live off of the taxes of those who do work.
How many of the 40% are illegal aliens or bogus asylum seekers sucking the blood of native-born Taxpayers ?
Maine’s issue is not unemployment, but the opposite. The lack of available workers for businesses to hire.
@Delia, most are not worth hiring, especially young people. They cannot write, poor people skills, poor work habits if they have any. Not to mention the paid leave fiasco. I have not seen any help wanted signs out except at Hannafords, even the local paper has been slim.
WHERE in maine are hospitality jobs averaging $25 an hour? Not in Rumford! Not even close!
And yet we’re going to pay teachers $46.36 to start, which will probably lead to an average pay of somewhere in the range of $70-$90 an hour.
Essentially twice what business and professional workers are paid, with many of those having to have multiple degrees and many more years in college than a teacher has.
Am I the only person who sees something wrong with this?
One needs to remember that people working under the table, for whatever reason, are included in the four in 10 because as far as the state knows, they aren’t working.
That said, it’s not a shortage of employees, it’s a shortage of employees willing and able to work with the low wages they are offered. I just spent $40 for a haircut, that included a five dollar tip which I consider part of the bill. Now, if I was working for minimum wage, how the hell I can afford that — I’m not, and yet an employer is gonna want somebody who is well attired. Likewise anyone see the price of clothing recently?
So if you don’t want employees showing up in a T-shirt and torn jeans, and aren’t going to provide a uniform for them, well????
Reality is that Maine is a rural state. Some of us like it that way.
But it isn’t like Boston where there’s a bus on the street corner that goes directly to where you work every 15 minutes, day or night. Employees want employees available at the drop of a hat, but aren’t willing to pay them enough to own and maintain a car. So employee is gonna start handing out flying carpets?!?
The bottom line that a lot of people forget about is that unless someone ends the day with more after having worked otherwise would’ve had, if it winds up costing them more than they make, and they lose money, they ain’t gonna work. None of us would.
A corporate CEO would shut down the company if it kept loosing him money.
And employees need to drop their expectations a little bit, you want summer with three college degrees to mow lawns?!?
There’s a reason why L.L. Bean had to move its call center down to Portland in the 80s, it had been in Freeport (with the local 865 phone number) — every fall, Beans hires an awful lot of part-time workers, both to answer phones and to pack orders. They promised each and every one of them a nice full-time job if they work hard.
Every Christmas, they have massive layoffs and almost all of these part-time employees never get the full-time job they were promised. Years back, I was one of them.
And for years after that, every fall, I would get a postcard or a letter — often both — asking me if I’d like to work for L.L. Bean this fall. RIGHT…….
What companies like Beans, Shaw’s, Hannaford’s, etc. have done is destroy the Maine work ethic. Young people realize that they’re not gonna be paid well, they’re not gonna get ahead, so why bother?
THEY KNOW THAT IF THEY WANT TO MAKE ANY MONEY, THEY HAVE TO LEAVE THE STATE….