October unemployment rate better than September's

11/20/2012 (Updated 10:45:01 PM)

BINGHAMTON -- Binghamton's unemployment rate for the month of October is in, and we are better employed than we were in September.  But, we don't have as many jobs as we did last year at this time.

Local economist Christian Harris said that the latest numbers show the unemployment rate for October is at 8.3%.

That is down from 8.5% in September, but it's higher than it was a year ago when unemployment in the Binghamton area was an even  8%.

"The nation's been improving at a better pace than we have, we're kind of in a bit of a slowdown. We've seen some cutbacks overall locally.  So we're definitely not as good a pace trend-wise as the nation.  But we're kind of lockstep state-wide," said Harris.

The New York State jobless rate for October was 8.3%, the same as the Binghamton area.

Nationally, it was 7.5%.