Mission employment reaches all-time high
Job growth continues and unemployment decline is sharpest in RGV
MISSION, TX – APRIL 2, 2018 — Mission added 900 jobs to the local economy in the last year and that helped drop its unemployment rate to 6.0 percent in February – the second lowest February rate in a decade and down from 7.7 percent one year ago.
The city now has about 34,433 people employed, the most ever recorded for Mission, according to the Texas Workforce Commission’s latest figures released in March. In fact, from December 2017 to February 2018, Mission logged the highest number of people employed since the Texas Workforce Commission has kept figures for cities in 2005.
Mission’s 6.0 percent unemployment rate for February was a drop from the city’s 7.7 percent drop one year ago (February 2017). The decrease was the sharpest among cities in the Rio Grande Valley. The 1.7 percent decline shows a sustained economic vitality in the city, said Mission EDC CEO Alex Meade.
“The Mission EDC is engaging local small and large businesses, recruiting new companies, facilitating startups and providing cyber-security training all with the goal of creating new jobs for Mission,” said Meade. “We are very pleased to see the addition of new jobs and the growth the city is experiencing. It gives our board, Mayor Salinas and our staff a positive indication that we are moving in the right direction.”
Additionally, the new unemployment rate ranks Mission third among all RGV cities the Texas Workforce Commission measured bested only by Edinburg and McAllen’s 4.9 jobless rate. The McAllen-Edinburg-Mission metro area continues to have the state’s highest unemployment rate at 7.1 percent. The Brownsville-Harlingen metro area stood at 6.7 percent for February.
Some of the biggest employment gains in the metro area came via several industries such as education and health professions, professional and business services, leisure and hospitality and manufacturing, according to the Texas Workforce Commission.
These sectors each expanded by hundreds with new jobs over the last year. Mission and the two metro areas’ rates were higher than Texas’ overall state unemployment of 4.1 percent. Still, Mission has added 900 jobs in the last year and nearly 2,600 over the last five years.
For more information contact Alex Meade at 956-585-0040, or ameade@missionedc.com.
