Indiana unemployment numbers are in for the month of December. They have hit another unprecedented low rate for the Midwest region.

Indiana – Statewide Unemployment Rate

The statewide unemployment rate to 1.3-percent has been updated by the Department of Workforce Development. However, there are some counties that are falling even lower than that. Also, the local experts do say when they look at Indiana unemployment rates historically, the numbers are really “absurdly low,” despite many companies looking to fill jobs.

The Director of a local Indianapolis Community Research Institute, Rachel Blakeman, has said the employers are telling the truth. That is when hiring is really challenging right now. However, the solution may not be a quick fix.

Workers – Retirement and COVID-19 Exposures

“In fact, we can then anticipate that workers that were coming close to retirement have decided to leave the workforce. Moreover, retirement options are really starting to look very attractive to people in 2021,” Blakeman said. “Therefore, we can anticipate, especially in the recent months that childcare centers are closing temporarily because of COVID exposures. There is difficulty finding new openings. This is because childcare centers have not historically paid well. So their workers may actually be deciding it is time to go work for Amazon, or Sweetwater or another employer who will pay more.”

People are retiring, according to Blakeman, they are choosing to leave the workplace has contributed to getting Indiana to its lowest unemployment numbers to date. A local county has the highest rate of unemployment in the eleven county areas. In fact, matching the statewide rate at just 1.3%. Moreover, the local county has the lowest unemployment rate in the state at .7%.

“Also, from the perspective of under 1% unemployment, this is really unheard of, so I can’t say well, the last time when we were, in fact, below 1% unemployment, here it went on to play out,” said Blakeman. “In fact, We are making this up as we go along.”