LI jobless rate is not NY's best, or worst

Long Island doesn’t have the state’s best unemployment rate. But it doesn’t have the worst either.

The latter distinction goes to New York City, where the 10.3 percent jobless rate in June was the highest of any major metro area in the state, according to state Labor Department data released Tuesday. A year ago the city’s rate was 8.9 percent.

Long Island’s rate in June was 7.7 percent, the highest for that month since 2009, and compares with 7 percent a year earlier.

The best rate in the state is Ithaca’s 7.2 percent. But as was the case with the jobless rates in all the major metro areas, that rate increased significantly from a year earlier. It was 6.5 percent in June 2011.

Among Long Island’s incorporated areas, Hempstead Village had the highest unemployment rate -- 9.5 percent, up from 8.6 percent a year earlier. Rockville Centre had the lowest -- 6.3 percent, up from 5.4 percent.

The rising rates here reflect that the Island’s slowing employment growth is too weak to accommodate both the unemployed and new entrants to the job market.