A contracting labor force led to Mercer County's jobless rate falling from 4.4 percent in July to 4 percent in August.

The county's jobless rate was below the national 5.7 percent rate and the state's 5.3 percent rate.

In August 2001 the county's jobless rate was 4.7 percent.

Mercer County ranked 5th among the state's 43 labor market areas in terms of the best unemployment rate and tied for 8th place with Chester, Dauphin and Union counties among the state's 66 counties.

Figures for August show the county's civilian labor force fell 900 from July to stand at 58,400.

The decline was attributed to summer job seekers who entered the labor pool over the past three months began their departure.

At the same time those employed fell by 600 to 56,100 in August, mainly due to students leaving jobs to return to school.

Those unemployed fell by 300 to 2,300 in August. The number of unemployed has fallen by 500 from August 2001.

Goods producing jobs fell by 100 in August with 200 manufacturing jobs being lost and 100 jobs added in construction and mining.

Service producing jobs were off by 600 in August with services accounting for half of those losses.

The average weekly earnings for manufacturing workers in the county slid to $618.85 in August from $636.20 as employees in this sector saw a slight decrease in their average weekly working hours.

Forest County had the highest unemployment rate in the state at 14.2 percent while Centre and Cumberland counties were the lowest at 3.3 percent.

Surrounding county's unemployment rates were:

   » Lawrence, 5.7 percent

   » Butler, 4.9 percent

   » Crawford, 6.9 percent

   » Venango, 5 percent

Sharon's jobless rate was 5 percent. A rate is kept for Sharon because it's the county's largest city.