Unemployment in the District has been rising in the past year, to 8.2 percent in February from 6.2 percent in February 2004.
The District is generating thousands of new jobs, but they appear to be going mostly to suburbanites. Mayor Anthony A. Williams (D) and several D.C. Council members have proposed changes to laws meant to encourage employment of D.C. residents, especially those in poor neighborhoods.
While unemployment has risen in each of the District's eight wards in the past year, a review of the figures shows that Washington's poorest residents are worse off. Ward 8, east of the Anacostia River, had the highest rate at 15.4 percent in February, according to the D.C. Department of Employment Services, up from 12.5 percent a year earlier. Looking at the problem from another angle, Ward 8 accounted for 9 percent of the D.C. labor force but 17 percent of the District's increase in unemployment over the past year.
In Ward 7, also east of the river but which has more middle-class residents, unemployment was 9.5 percent, up from 7.7 percent a year earlier.
In affluent Ward 3, in Northwest, unemployment rose to 2.8 percent from 2.2 percent a year earlier.
-- Neil Irwin
