Tight job market easing?

• Position: Unemployment in Indiana - Brief Article

For seven consecutive years beginning in 1993, the Indiana unemployment rate was at least a full percentage point less than the national jobless rate. But that record is quietly coming to an end in the year 2000. Since the end of last year, unemployment rates in Indiana have slowly edged upward, so that the gap between the U.S. and the state in July stood at a mere four-tenths of a percentage point.

For the first time since 1991, the ranks of the unemployed actually rose during the first half of the year 2000, by about 10,000 workers. Since this rise was accompanied by 33,000 net new jobs, the net result was a slightly higher unemployment rate for the state economy. But...