Seminole County’s jobless rate remained relatively flat in March, rising by one tenth of a percent over March 2020.

According to a report released last week by the Oklahoma Employment Security Commission (OESC), the county posted a rate of 4.9 percent in March, a slight increase over last March when the rate was an even five percent.

In February, the county unemployment rate was up nearly two percentage points over the previous year and in January the rate was 29 percent higher than it was in January 2020.

The OESC report shows Seminole County had an available work force of 9,211 in March, but only 8,750 of those available were counted as employed.

In Hughes County, the rate increased from 5.4 percent in March 2020 to 5.5 percent, Pottawatomie County’s rate jumped from 3.5 percent to 4.2 percent and in Lincoln County, the rate declined from 3.7 per-cent to 3.6 percent.

Latimer County posted Oklahoma’s highest county unemployment rate of 8.6 percent in March. Le Flore County had the second-highest rate for the month, followed by McIntosh County. Cimarron and Texas Counties shared the lowest county unemployment rate of 1.6 percent in March.

Unemployment rates were higher than a year earlier in 58 of Oklahoma’s 77 counties, lower in 13 counties, and unchanged in 6 counties.