Minnesota April jobless rate steady at 3.8 percent; 15K jobs added

Minnesota's unemployment rate held firm in April at a seasonally adjusted 3.8 percent as employers added 15,100 jobs, the highest one-month gain since September 2013, state officials said Thursday.

While the state's jobless rate remained significantly below the 4.4 percent overall United States unemployment rate, the nation's one-year job growth rate came in at 1.4 percent, outpacing Minnesota's 1.2 growth rate the past 12 months, according to data released by the Minnesota Department of Employment and Economic Development.

The state has added 34,715 jobs over the past year.

"Minnesota has already added nearly 23,000 jobs in the first four months of 2017. That job growth combined with rising wages and increasing work hours all point to strong labor market conditions statewide," DEED Commissioner Shawntera Hardy said in a statement.

Education and health services led all sectors in April with 4,300 new jobs, followed by construction (up 3,600), government (up 3,000), professional and business services (up 2,700), the department reported.

Sectors that lost jobs included trade, transportation and utilities (down 700), financial activities (down 500) and logging and mining (down 100).