April Jobless Rate Falls to 0.7% in the ND Oil Patch

The state of North Dakota reported last week that the jobless rate in both the city of Williston and in the surrounding Williams County fell to an eye-popping low of 0.7% in April (see chart above), the lowest jobless rate ever recorded in North Dakota history, and possibly the lowest jobless rate in history for any city or county in the entire United States. Also in April, there were ten North Dakota counties with jobless rates below 2%, and all of those ten counties are on the western edge of the Peace Garden state in the oil-rich Bakken region (see map below).  If there were ever any doubts about the potential that domestic energy production has to create shovel-ready jobs, the 0.7% jobless rate in the heart of the Bakken region in North Dakota seems like pretty convincing evidence that those doubts are without any foundation.
  

Click map to enlarge.