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© Copyright 1998 by the Wyoming Department of Employment, Research & Planning

This month Wyoming Labor Force Trends is supplying the current Covered Employment and Wages data for the quarter, with running monthly totals over the year (see Table 1). Trends will continue to offer this data for every quarter, as it becomes available.

The highest level of monthly employment in 1997 was in June (226,974), due to the seasonal nature of many of the jobs in Wyoming. The lowest level of monthly employment occurred in February (204,310) for the same reason.

As shown in Table 2, the three industries with the most average monthly employment in the fourth quarter of 1997 were Services (45,297), Retail Trade (44,386) and Local Government (35,648). The three industries with the least average monthly employment were Wholesale Trade (7,847), Federal Government (6,871), and Agriculture (2,972).

The percent change from fourth quarter 1996 to 1997 by industry shows that the largest gain in employment was in Mining (7.7%). The biggest loss in employment was in Federal Government (-1.3%). In terms of total payroll, the largest percent gain was in Mining (11.7%) and the smallest gain was in Local Government (1.8%). The highest and lowest average weekly wage percent changes were in the Federal Government (10.5%) and Local Government (1.9%).

The three industries with the highest average weekly wages for fourth quarter 1997 were Mining ($942), Federal Government ($770) and Transportation, Communications, & Public Utilities ($679).

By county, Natrona had the highest numerical average monthly employment increase (974 employees) from fourth quarter 1996 to 1997 (see Table 3). The highest percent increase of employees was in Platte County with a 7.5 percent increase. Lincoln County lost the most employees (-312) while the greatest percentage loss of employees was in Hot Springs (-12.7%).

Total payroll for fourth quarter 1997 rose 6.6 percent from the previous year (see Table 3). Teton County gained 15.4 percent in total payroll ($10,930,781) while Hot Springs County lost 33.2 percent from the previous year (-$4,613,050). In terms of average weekly wage, Teton County gained the most, up 9.0 percent from the previous year ($41) and Hot Springs lost the most, down 23.4 percent (-$113).

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