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More than 20,000 Fairfax County residents were unemployed for the 10th consecutive month in April, highlighting mounting concerns about Northern Virginia’s shrinking job market and loss of workers.
State data released June 3 showed 612,551 Fairfax residents employed in the civilian workforce and 20,272 seeking work. The county’s preliminary, non-seasonally-adjusted unemployment rate reached 3.2%, up from 2.8% a year earlier.
May 2025 was the last month when Fairfax had fewer than 20,000 unemployed residents, with 19,741 people out of work as the Trump administration’s federal workforce reductions began taking effect. Before the current stretch, county unemployment had not exceeded 20,000 since August 2021, during the COVID-19 vaccine rollout.
The number of employed Fairfax residents fell 3% from April 2025, reflecting a broader, longer-running departure of workers from Northern Virginia.
“We’re down about 108,000 jobs year over year — that’s a challenge,” said Terry Clower, director of the Center for Regional Analysis at George Mason University’s Schar School of Policy & Government.
Speaking at a June 3 regional economic forum sponsored by Mason, Clower said the decline began before the pandemic and extends beyond the more recent federal cutbacks. COVID-19 intensified the trend as residents left Northern Virginia and did not return, he said.
Housing costs have been identified as one reason for that out-migration.
“Our #1 challenge? Very simply, we need more housing supply,” said Ryan McLaughlin, CEO of the Northern Virginia Association of Realtors.
McLaughlin urged local leaders to move beyond discussion and pursue concrete solutions, arguing that the region must reconsider approaches developed over the past 30 years.
Fairfax County officials are evaluating ways to expand housing availability, but the Board of Supervisors’ target of creating 10,000 additional affordable homes by 2034 remains difficult to reach.
The City of Fairfax also recorded weakening employment figures. Its April unemployment rate rose to 3%, compared with 2.7% a year earlier. The city had 13,900 employed residents and 424 people looking for work.
April was the sixth consecutive month in which fewer than 14,000 city residents were employed in the civilian workforce. It was also the 11th straight month with more than 400 residents unemployed.
Across Northern Virginia, the April jobless rate climbed to 3.8% from 2.7% a year earlier. The region’s civilian workforce totaled 1.67 million, including about 54,700 people seeking jobs.
Virginia’s statewide unemployment rate rose from 3% to 3.4% over the same period.
National figures offered a mixed picture. Among 387 metropolitan areas, unemployment rates were higher than a year earlier in 200, lower in 152 and unchanged in 35. The national non-seasonally-adjusted rate was 4%, essentially unchanged from April 2025.
Rapid City and Sioux Falls, South Dakota, posted the country’s lowest metropolitan unemployment rates at 1.7%. El Centro, California, had the highest at 16.5%.
Among 56 metropolitan areas with more than 1 million residents, Birmingham and Honolulu shared the lowest rate at 2.4%, while Fresno, California, had the highest at 8.1%.
Nonfarm payroll employment increased year over year in four metropolitan areas and decreased in four, while remaining essentially unchanged in the other 379. Las Vegas posted the largest employment gain, adding 23,600 jobs.
The Washington metropolitan region suffered the nation’s largest decline, losing 97,100 jobs, or 2.9%.
All April 2026 figures are preliminary, non-seasonally-adjusted and subject to revision.