Skip to main content
Clear icon
55º

Florida unemployment drops to 6.5% in October

51,600 jobs added in October

FILE - This May 7, 2020, file photo shows a man wearing a mask while walking under a Now Hiring sign at a CVS Pharmacy during the coronavirus outbreak in San Francisco. On Thursday, Nov. 12, the number of people seeking unemployment benefits fell last week to 709,000, the fourth straight drop and a sign that the job market is slowly healing. The figures coincide with a sharp resurgence in confirmed viral infections to an all-time high above 120,000 a day. (AP Photo/Jeff Chiu, File) (Jeff Chiu, Copyright 2020 The Associated Press. All rights reserved)

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. – Florida’s unemployment rate dropped 0.7 percentage point to 6.5% in October, according to statistics released by the state on Friday.

There were 659,000 jobless Floridians out of a workforce of 10.1 million people. The jobless rate was 3.6 percentage points higher than October 2019.

Recommended Videos



[TRENDING: Gov: Vaccine coming to Florida ‘relatively soon’ | CDC: Avoid Thanksgiving travel | Georgia presidential race recount results]

The state's unemployment rate was slightly lower than the national rate of 6.9%.

October saw an increase of 51,600 jobs, according to the Department of Economic Opportunity.

Wakulla County had the state's lowest unemployment at 3.5%, followed by St. Johns County at 3.7% and Santa Rosa and Okaloosa counties at 3.8%.

Osceola County had the highest unemployment rate at 10.4%, followed by Miami-Dade County at 8.8% and Orange County at 8.5%.