Gov. Scott: Tampa Area Added More Than 31,000 Jobs Over the Year

Press Release

Today, Governor Rick Scott announced the Tampa area added 31,800 new jobs over the year in July 2015. The unemployment rate in the Tampa metro area declined by 1.1 percentage points over the year from 6.5 percent in July 2014 to 5.4 percent in July 2015. Florida businesses have added 917,400 private-sector jobs since December 2010.

Governor Scott said, "With the second-highest number of jobs of all areas in the state last month, the Tampa economy continues to thrive. We will keep working to cut taxes and grow opportunities to make Florida the global destination for jobs."

The industries with the largest gain in jobs over the year were leisure and hospitality with 14,400 new jobs, education and health services with 6,800 new jobs, and trade, transportation, and utilities with 5,500 new jobs. The Tampa Bay MSA was first among the state metro areas in online job demand in July 2015 with 48,801 openings. The metro area was also first in the state in demand for high wage, high skill science technology engineering math (STEM) occupations with 15,157 openings in July.

Florida created 16,900 private-sector jobs in July 2015, and a total of 917,400 private-sector jobs since December 2010. Florida's statewide unemployment rate for July 2015 was 5.4 percent. In July, more than 36,600 Floridians were placed in jobs by CareerSource Tampa Bay and the state's other 23 regional workforce boards.

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