The unemployment rate in New Jersey declined during the month of September from 9.9 percent to a total of 9.8 percent. The information on the unemployment rate for the state was recently released by the Labor Department, showing that the unemployment rate did decline a bit. While the decline was relatively small, it is still some sort of progress for the state. The decline occurred even after the state ended up shedding a total of 1,200 jobs. The state has lost a number of jobs over the past year. Just last month, the private sector managed to add around 1,100 jobs but unfortunately, those job gains were offset because of the 2,300 job losses that occurred within the public sector.

The unemployment rate for the United States as a whole ended up dropping more than the unemployment rate for the state of New Jersey, going from 8.1 percent to 7.8 percent during last month. The chief economist for the Treasury Department of the state, Charles Steindel, has said, “While New Jersey’s job market in September still showed the effect of the summer doldrums apparent in the national figures these last few months, there are positive signs.” He also said, “Our long-term uptrend in private sector employment continues and September’s dip in unemployment might be a sign that the situation will be getting better.”

This recent report about the decline of unemployed individuals in the state of New Jersey is also the 39^th month in a row that the state has managed to keep an unemployment rate under the 9 percent level. The Governor of the state, Chris Christie, believes that New Jersey is currently going through a comeback and feels as though the unemployment picture is going to drastically improve over the next few months. Even so, the rate has continued to increase while the state was adding jobs but that seems to be a sign that more people were looking for employment and entering into the workforce.

This has Christie’s administration questioning the way in which the unemployment rate is actually calculated. A spokesperson for Chris Christie, Kevin Robert, said that the governor is leading the state in the right direction and that recent economic reports are proof of that. The Christie administration has been focusing primarily on private sector jobs and Christie usually takes the blame for the public sector job losses. Roberts said, “Though we have more work to do, once again, the long-term trend of job growth in New Jersey under Governor Christie remains steady and positive — with the private sector consistently adding jobs over the course of this administration.”