Tom Austin from the Illinois Department of Employment Security says in April of last year the Quad Cities unemployment rate was 15.9 per cent. Then, last month it fell to 5.6 per cent. Another way to look at it is - overall job losses of about 600 were more than offset by job gains here of more than 13,000.
"And now that we have an optimistic outlook on where we are with the pandemic, there are some positive signs we're seeing in the local job markets."
Compared to April of last year, the Quad Cities lost jobs in manufacturing, financial activities, and wholesale trade, but gained back many more in leisure and hospitality, education and health, retail, and construction.
Unemployment also improved during the past month, dropping three-tenths of one per cent from March to April.
