by Calculated Risk on 8/19/2011 10:30:00 AM

From the BLS: Regional and State Employment and Unemployment Summary

Regional and state unemployment rates were generally little changed in July. Twenty-eight states and the District of Columbia registered unemployment rate increases, nine states recorded rate decreases, and thirteen states had no rate change, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported today.
...
Nevada continued to register the highest unemployment rate among the states, 12.9 percent in July. California recorded the next highest rate, 12.0 percent. North Dakota reported the lowest jobless rate, 3.3 percent, followed by Nebraska, 4.1 percent. ...

Nevada recorded the largest jobless rate decrease from July 2010 (-2.0 percentage points). Ten additional states had smaller but also statistically significant decreases over the year: New Mexico (-1.8 percentage points), Indiana (-1.6 points), Michigan and Oklahoma (-1.5 points each), Oregon (-1.2 points), Wyoming (-1.1 points), Ohio (-1.0 point), Florida (-0.8 point), Virginia (-0.7 point), and North Dakota (-0.6 point). The remaining 39 states and the District of Columbia registered unemployment rates that were not appreciably different from those of a year earlier.

The following graph shows the current unemployment rate for each state (red), and the max during the recession (blue). If there is no blue, the state is currently at the maximum during the recession.

Click on graph for larger image in graph gallery.

The states are ranked by the highest current unemployment rate.

Three states are at new 2007 recession highs: Arkansas (8.2%), Texas (8.4%) and Montana (7.7%).

The fact that 39 states and the District of Columbia have seen little or no improvement over the last year is a reminder that the unemployment crisis is ongoing.