December 1, 1998 (The Editor’s Desk is updated each business day.)

Nevada's Clark County reported largest percent increase in employment in 1996

Of the 290 counties with 75,000 employees or more, Clark County, Nevada, had the largest percent increase in employment (9.1 percent) during 1996. Clark County is part of the Las Vegas metropolitan area. Overall, 132 of the large counties had rates of employment growth in 1996 above the national average of 2.1 percent.

[Chart data—TXT]

Placer County, California, had the second largest percent increase in employment (8.6 percent), followed by 8.4-percent increases in both Maricopa County, Arizona (part of the Phoenix metropolitan area), and Washington, Oregon (part of the Portland metropolitan area), and a 7.0-percent increase in Collin, Texas (part of the Dallas metropolitan area). The employment increase reported in Maricopa County was 7.2 percent when reporting changes that did not represent true employment increases were excluded. (The changes affected the county in which State government jobs were reported.)

The largest absolute gains in employment were recorded in the counties of Maricopa, Arizona (100,210); Dallas, Texas (57,015); Los Angeles, California (55,680); Santa Clara, California (48,848); and Clark, Nevada (45,666).  After adjusting for reporting changes, the number of new jobs in Maricopa County was roughly 85,000.

These data are a product of the BLS Covered Employed and Wages (ES-202) program. Additional information is available from news release USDL 98-443, "Employment and Average Annual Pay for Large Counties, 1996."