A sharp drop in the state's unemployment rate to 6.3 percent and an over-the-year increase in nonfarm jobs marked a positive note at the three-year anniversary of the start of the last recession. Still, Iowa remains almost 56,000 jobs behind its high mark set 2 1/2 years ago.
IPP Statement 1/25/11

"As President Obama prepares to focus on jobs in his State of the Union address tonight, job growth remains a challenge for Iowa."
— IPP Research Associate Noga O'Connor

Note: These are archives of previous Iowa JobWatch summaries by IPP, using data from Iowa Workforce Development. The data for the most recent month typically are revised in the following month. This is one reason that IPP analysts stress longer-term trends and reflections on the numbers, rather than an overemphasis on one-month estimates.
November numbers (HTML) 12/17/10
October numbers (HTML) 11/23/10
September numbers (HTML) 10/22/10
August numbers (HTML) 9/21/10
July numbers (HTML) 8/20/10
June numbers (HTML) 7/20/10
May numbers (HTML) 6/18/10
April numbers (1 page PDF) 5/21/10
March numbers (1 page PDF) 4/16/10
February numbers (1 page PDF) 3/26/10
January numbers (1 page PDF) 3/10/10

This graph offers a look at monthly average nonfarm job changes in Iowa from 1991 to the present.