Douglas County Economic Indicators - November
The November 2024 edition of the Douglas County Economic Indicators is also available on Quality Info.
Douglas County added 140 jobs from October 2023 to October 2024. Government and manufacturing were among the industries that added jobs, while leisure and hospitality and retail trade declined. Seasonally adjusted unemployment was 5.0%, which is 0.2 percentage points higher than October of last year.
This month’s special graph is a deeper dive on health care employment. Technically, the graph shows private education and health care employment, a common grouping in economic data. However, for most places the portion of the sector in health care specifically makes the private education element a minor contributor to the trend.
Health care has been the most steadily growing sector of employment across Oregon in recent decades. That’s true in Douglas as well, although the county experienced slower growth during the decade from 2008-2018. Relative to 2001, Douglas has 70% more health care employment, versus about 90% more in the state.
The experience of the sector across recessions makes a good case for the value of economic diversification The 2008 recession, devastating in sectors such as construction and manufacturing, slowed growth but didn’t cause major job declines in health care. 2020 on the other hand saw greater job loss in health care, as disruptions from COVID-19 caused facility closures and a steep decline in routine medical care. Recovery has been strong however, and Douglas and state employment in health care are well above their historic peaks from late 2019.
This month’s articles included:
Oregon’s Hazelnut Harvest on Quality Info
Employment Among Oregon’s Veterans on Quality Info
Jobs in Oregon Correctional Institutions on Quality Info
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
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