Kentucky Unemployment Rate by County: Comparison Between Magoffin and Woodford Counties in 2000, 2008, and 2016

The unemployment rates across Kentucky are an ever-fluctuating statistic, as I’m sure is the case in many states if not all, but cannot seem to offset the negative impact with positive ones. The counties of Magoffin and Woodford, have consistently held the lowest and highest rate of unemployment throughout these 3 years respectively. Magoffin started off the 21st century with an unemployment rate of 10.5, setting the highest rate in Kentucky whereas Woodford was experiencing a much lower rate of 2.7. In 2008, both counties‘ rates rose to 10.7 in Magoffin, and 4.8 in Woodford (which is still the lowest rate in the state). Finally, in 2016, the rates both split in different directions, with Magoffin’s yet again rising to 18.8 and Woodford’s dropping to 3.2. But despite the fluctuating nature of the two sides of Kentucky’s unemployment coin, there is a much greater effect that can be seen here.

Amongst the fact that these counties hold the highest and lowest unemployment rates, they also stand as a sort of fading beacon for the state; where not only Magoffin county has low rates but so does the entire eastern region of Kentucky when compared to Woodford’s low rates and central Kentucky’s relatively low rates as well. This presents an entire issue in and of itself, that the issue of unemployment in this state isn’t just for one year and is a county-by-county situation, but that entire regions all experience the same hardships, and the unemployment rate across multiple years is a mere reflection of that fact.

The visualizations below depict the unemployment rates of all counties within Kentucky over the years 2000, 2008, and 2016. The more blue, the lower the rate while the more red, the higher the rate. I changed the color palette to include more colors to allow for greater variation between the rates.