Colorado Employment Situation – December 2021

9,000 Nonfarm Payroll Jobs Added in December; Unemployment Rate Declines to 4.8%

Household survey data:

According to the survey of households, Colorado’s seasonally adjusted unemployment rate fell three-tenths of a percentage point in December to 4.8 percent. The national unemployment rate declined by three-tenths of a percentage point to 3.9 percent.

Other highlights from the household survey:

Colorado’s labor force increased by 8,500 in December to 3,208,400. The share of Coloradans participating in the labor force improved to 68.3 percent last month. The state continues to experience a faster rate of recovery in the participation rate than the U.S.

The number of individuals employed in Colorado grew by 18,000 in December to 3,054,100, which represents 65.0 percent of the state’s 16+ population. Colorado’s employment-to-population ratio has trended upward over the past four months.

The Colorado counties with the highest unemployment rates in December were:  Pueblo (6.4%), Huerfano (6.3%), Las Animas (5.5%), Fremont (5.5%), and Rio Grande (5.2%). County-level unemployment rates are not seasonally adjusted and are directly comparable to Colorado’s December unadjusted rate of 4.1 percent.

Establishment survey data:
Employers in Colorado added 9,000 nonfarm payroll jobs from November to December for a total of 2,778,700 jobs, according to the survey of business establishments. Private sector payroll jobs increased 7,900 and government added 1,100 jobs. Over the past 20 months, Colorado has gained back 335,500 of the 375,800 nonfarm payroll jobs lost between February and April of 2020. That translates to a job recovery rate of 89.3 percent, which exceeds the U.S. rate of 84.0 percent.

The following are the unemployment percentages for counties in southeast Colorado: