By JOSH COTTON

jcotton@timesobserver.com

The unemployment rate fell in Warren County to a seasonally-adjusted 4.3 percent in September.

That’s a .3 percent increase from August and a .1 percent increase from the 4.2 percent rate in September 2018.

The Pennsylvania Department of Labor and Industry Center for Workforce Information and Analysis released the September data on Tuesday.

Warren County’s rate is near the lowest in the region.

Rates for Bradford and Erie were 5.0 percent and 4.2 percent, respectively, 6.1 percent in Forest County, 4.6 percent in Meadville and 4.8 percent in Oil City.

Warren County came in above the state unemployment rate of 4.0 percent and above the federal unemployment rate which came in at 3.5 percent in September.

Job gains were realized in service-providing, trade, transportation and utilities trade, government and local government while jobs were lost in total private, goods-producing and leisure and hospitality.

According to the Federal Bureau of Labor Statistics at the U.S. Department of Labor, seasonal adjustment “is a statistical technique that attempts to measure and remove the influences of predictable seasonal patterns to reveal how employment and unemployment changes from month-to-month.”

“These seasonal adjustments make it easier to observe the cyclical, underlying trend and other nonseasonal movements in the series,” making it possible to compare month-to-month.