Queens has state’s third-highest rate of unemployment

Pedestrians pass an unemployment office in Queens on June 11. AP Photo/Frank Franklin II

By David Brand

Few counties in New York have experienced the impact of COVID-19 quite like Queens.

The borough of 2.3 million people accounts for the state’s third highest unemployment rate at 16.4 percent, according to August statistics published by the Department of Labor Tuesday. Queens trails only Bronx County, at 21.1 percent, and Kings County — aka Brooklyn — at 16.5 percent.

Queens’ rate of unemployment is slightly higher than the New York City rate of 16.3 percent — which is nearly quadruple the city’s 4.2 percent unemployment rate in August 2019.

All five boroughs fared far worse than the state unemployment rate of 12.6 percent, which dropped from 15.9 percent in July. 

Rural counties have withstood the COVID crisis better than suburban and urban areas, though only one of New York’s 62 counties, Yates County, had an unemployment rate below 7 percent. The Yates rate was 6.9 percent.

The national unemployment rate was 8.5 percent last month.