The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported Fridaythe national unemployment rate of 4.3 percent in May dropped only by half a percentage point since January.

In Pennsylvania, the unemployment rate is slightly above the national average at 4.9 percent.Regionally, the Allentown-Bethlehem-Easton area was at 4.7 percent, and the Scranton-Wilkes-Barre area at 5.5 percent, which is down from its highest point of 6.2 percent in February, according to the BLS.The Pennsylvania Department of Labor and Industry Center for Workforce Information and Analysis broke down the unemployment rate by county.• Carbon County: 5.7 percent• Schuylkill County: 5.9 percent• Monroe County: 5.9 percent• Lehigh County: 5 percent• Northampton County: 4.9 percentDespite being slightly higher than the national average, unemployment throughout all five counties is at its lowest level since 2008. The highest unemployment was in 2010 with Schuylkill at the top with 11.5 percent and Northampton at 9.2 percent. Ever since early 2010, the unemployment rate has slowly continued to decrease.According to the federal government, only 24 percent of unemployed people have been jobless for more than 27 weeks. They are categorized as the long-term unemployed.The markets with the strongest gains in employment nationwide were in health care and mining.The BLS said employment in health care rose by 24,000 in May. More than 7,000 jobs were added a month in hospitals alone. Ambulatory health care services also continued to trend up with more than 13,000.The average job growth in health care was 22,000 per month in 2017, compared to an average of 32,000 per month in 2016.The mining industry added 7,000 jobs in May nationally, but was 1 percent or less of the jobs in this area.On the national level, employment in mining has risen by 47,000 since its low point in October 2016. Most of the gain was in support activities for mining.Health care and retail are the largest employers in Pennsylvania, which is similarly reflected in this region only with manufacturing occasionally bumping into second place.The figures by county from the state labor department are:• Carbon County: health care - 20.5 percent, retail - 11.9 percent• Schuylkill County: manufacturing - 21.4 percent, health care - 16 percent• Monroe County: accommodations and food service - 17 percent, retail - 16.9 percent• Lehigh County: health care - 21.7 percent, retail - 10.8 percent• Northampton County: manufacturing - 13 percent, health care - 12.7 percent