Last Year Saw High Job Growth In Texas, Houston

Texas created almost 311,000 jobs from January 2012 to January this year. Houston also got a good boost in job numbers.

Houston-area employers added more than 118,000 non-farm jobs during the same 12-month period, a 4.5 percent increase from the previous year, according to the Texas Workforce Commission. The numbers for Houston are not seasonally adjusted, while the state numbers are.

Lisa Givens with the Workforce Commission says mining and logging, which includes oil and gas related jobs, saw the biggest increase.

"Over the years that industry has gained 9,400 jobs in the Houston area, so a very strong industry. The growth rate for the mining and logging, as you can imagine, is very high at 9.9 percent."

Construction and manufacturing also saw high numbers of new jobs created.

While the numbers for Houston and Texas are good over a 12-month period, there were many job losses in January.  And after six months of a declining unemployment rate in Texas, the rate went up slightly for that month. But Givens says that isn't necessarily a bad sign.

"It's not unusual to see an upward tick in the unemployment rate or some job losses in January as the season of hiring is completing. And employers are maybe letting go some of those jobs that they had obtained through the seasonal hiring."

Unemployment rates in both Texas and Houston were significantly lower this January compared to the previous year.

Texas now has more than 11 million non-farm jobs.