
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: MONDAY, July 2, 1990                   TAG: 9007020258
SECTION: VIRGINIA                    PAGE: A4   EDITION: EVENING 
SOURCE: GEORGE KEGLEY BUSINESS EDITOR
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Short

JOBLESSNESS RISES

Adding college students in search of jobs to workers laid off by Singer and Rowe furniture factories raised the Roanoke area unemployment rate for May to 3.4 percent from the record low of 2.3 percent in April.

The Virginia Employment Commission reported the May jobless rate this morning. It said the Roanoke area's rate increased because 476 more people were drawing jobless benefits in May.

Only 1,068, an "extremely low number," drew benefits in April. That low 2.3 percent unemployment placed the Roanoke area as the sixth lowest in the country, said William F. Mezger, the VEC's research economist.

The jobless rate for the Roanoke area was below the 3.7 percent reported for the state, as well as all other metropolitan areas except Northern Virginia, leading with a low 2 percent unemployment in May.

Roanoke County had 2.8 percent unemployment in May, up from 1.8 percent in April; Roanoke City had 4.1 percent, up from 2.9 percent; Salem had 3.1 percent, up from 2 percent, and Botetourt County had 3.3 percent, up from 2 percent.

by CNB