McAllen is the only Valley city with unemployment rates below five percent

For the second consecutive month, during August 2018, McAllen was the only city in the Rio Grande Valley with an unemployment rate of under five percent, according to the Texas Workforce Commission.

McAllen’s latest unemployment rate of 4.9 percent was followed closely by Edinburg, which reported an unemployment rate of 5 percent for August 2018.

The unemployment rate is a key indicator of the strength of the local economy. The August 2018 unemployment rates for the Valley’s most populated cities follow: McAllen: 4.9 percent Edinburg: 5 percent Harlingen: 5.7 percent Mission: 6 percent Brownsville: 6.3 percent Pharr: 7.5 percent Weslaco: 7.9 percent The state’s unemployment rate in August 2018 was 3.9 percent, compared with 4.4 percent in August 2017. The U.S. unemployment rate in August 2018 was 3.9 percent, compared with 4.4 percent the same month the previous year, according to the U.S. Department of Labor (https://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS14000000).The number of jobs in cities and counties statewide is independently documented by the Texas Workforce Commission, a state agency with many key duties, such as maintaining and reporting on key trends in state and local economies, including unemployment rates and the number of people employed in cities. The unemployment rate is the number of persons unemployed, expressed as a percentage of the civilian labor force, according to the Texas Workforce Commission. The civilian labor force is that portion of the population age 16 and older employed or unemployed. To be considered unemployed, a person has to be not working but willing and able to work and actively seeking work. According to the Texas Workforce Commission, for the month of August 2018, these are the employment figures, in terms of jobs, for the seven largest cities in the Valley: Brownsville: 70,370 McAllen: 61,986 Edinburg: 38,087 Mission: 31,694 Pharr: 27,856 Harlingen: 23,169 Weslaco: 14,345 Also according to the Texas Workforce Commission, the major cities in the four-county Valley have recorded the following monthly unemployment rates during 2018 and 2017:

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