Employment in Vermont has been in a steady decline this year that got steeper in April.
The latest monthly data shows the state lost 900 jobs last month, an estimated 0.3% reduction in employees on payroll compared with March. It was the largest drop so far in 2026.
“The size of Vermont’s labor force continues to steadily decline even as higher costs put pressure on household budgets across the state,” said Kendal Smith, commissioner of the Vermont Department of Labor, in a statement released with the updated data last week.
The report also found a decline in the percentage of residents who are working or trying to find work. That metric, known as the civilian labor force participation rate, was 62.7% in April, a drop of 0.2 percentage points from the prior month’s revised estimate.
A number of factors could be contributing to that decrease, including Vermont’s generally older workforce aging out and a population decline in the aftermath of a 2020 spike in residents moving to the state, according to Mathew Barewicz, director of economic and labor market information for the Vermont Department of Labor.
In short, both the number of workers on payrolls and the share of Vermonters in the labor force decreased.
“In this case, they do point in the same direction, which is they’re both pointing to employment being down,” said Barewicz.
Yet, the state’s unemployment rate has held steady at around 2.6% since the start of 2025, according to the Labor Department, even as the number of jobs decreased in April.
Differences in the way the jobs data and unemployment rate are calculated can yield mixed signals. The jobs data is calculated by polling business owners about the number of employees on the payroll, according to Barewicz. The unemployment rate is derived from surveys of working-age residents, asking whether they are participating in the workforce. That survey captures people who are not included in the payroll data, such as the self-employed, Barewicz said.
Concerns about affordability may factor into larger economic trends and thus affect the number of people employed by businesses, according to Barewicz. The Department of Labor has also observed an uptick in the number of Vermonters reporting multiple jobs, he said.
“As an economist, I’m thinking in terms of how are individual households doing and how are their decisions playing out in the data that we can see. And to me, that again points to that affordability issue, and just the recent increases in prices,” Barewicz said.
The state unemployment rate remains far below the national average of 4.3%, according to the department. The rate is not consistent across the state, though, with some counties such as Orleans reporting higher unemployment.
Barewicz said he was waiting for the May data to get a fuller picture of jobs in the state. Although the data is seasonally adjusted, April is not always the clearest barometer, he said.
