History of Unemployment Rates in Texas

It’s no secret that the global pandemic COVID-19 has largely disrupted the job market. Many Americans have been forced out of work and are now left wondering when life will return back to normal. Unfortunately, Texas has been no exception to this trend, with the unemployment rate quadrupling between February and April of 2020.

As ‘unprecedented’ as the coronavirus is, this isn’t the first time we’ve seen large spikes in the unemployment numbers. A new report by Grand Canyon University mapped out the history of unemployment rates in each U.S. state, and it may serve as a glimmer of hope for local Texans.

Where We Came From

The unemployment rate is a value expected to fluctuate. It’s reactive to recessions, wars, and most recently, pandemics. The good news is, looking back at where we came from and how we recovered will help to give us a better idea of what’s next.

In the early 1980s, a global recession, combined with an energy crisis and soaring inflation rates, put millions of Americans out of work. The national unemployment rate peaked at around 9.7% in 1982. Fortunately, this value was back to a stable state and one of its lowest points by the end of the decade.

Again in 2010 with the great recession, unemployment jumped back up to 9.6% thanks to the bursting of the US housing bubble and mortgage crisis of ‘08. While this took time to recover from, similarly to that of the ‘80s, unemployment was at one of its lowest points prior to the global pandemic.

In both cases of disaster, the rates of joblessness in Texas increased along with the national trends. However, in each instance, the rates never surpassed those of the U.S. as a whole and peaked at lower percentages than the national ones. In 1982, the unemployment rate in Texas hung around 6.9%. In 2010, unemployment in Texas leveled around 7.6%. While neither of these values are ideal, they’re certainly not the worst case scenario.

Where We Are Now

As of April 2020, the Texas unemployment rate was up to 12.8%. Compared to the 3.5% rate that Texas averaged for 2019, that’s a big deal. GCU points out that prior to 2020, it had been over 70 years since the national unemployment reached double digits - even through the recessions of the 1980s and 2010s.

Still, compared to the national unemployment rate of 14.7% in April 2020, Texas isn’t so bad off. Consider states like Nevada, which have an unemployment rate of upwards of 28%, or Michigan at over 22% - both nearly double our local percentages. When put in perspective, Texas isn’t necessarily the best state for finding a job in these trying times, but it’s definitely not the worst.

The moral of the story is, if history repeats itself as it so often does, things are going to be okay. Texas has a history of maintaining a relatively stable unemployment rate in times of crisis, and from the data we’re seeing so far, this holds true when it comes to COVID-19. While it’s seemingly impossible to predict when the country will have the pandemic under control, it seems likely that we’ll begin to see promising trends in the economy in the near future.