Illinois unemployment rate tops national average; state ends 2025 with fewer jobs

By Glenn Minnis | The Center Square contributor
The Center Square

(The Center Square) – Illinois State Rep. Chris Miller argues numbers tell the story as new U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics data highlight the state’s unemployment rate is outpacing that of the national average.

Statistics show Illinois lost 17,000 jobs in 2025, leaving at least 302,000 residents still looking for work. At the same time across the country, employers added upward of 584,000 posts, settling the national unemployment rate at 4.4%, compared to 4.6% in Illinois.

Miller insists figuring out reasons for the differences grow easier by the day.

“When you compare the cost of doing business in the state of Illinois and cost of doing business in other places that are more business-friendly, the answer is the exodus from Illinois continues because of bad public policy and then the hostile environment for working families and small business,” the lawmaker told TCS. “There is less opportunity for small businesses and middle-class families to thrive and therefore as businesses leave the rate of unemployment goes up.”

Since 2020, the state’s job market has struggled to recover from the pandemic, ending 2025 as just one of 16 states to shed jobs over the last year to now rank No. 46 in the country in job recovery over the last five years. By comparison, four of the six neighboring states (Missouri, Iowa, Indiana and Wisconsin) ended 2025 with an unemployment rate below 4%.

“We are our own worst enemy because of the bad public policy,” Miller said. “If we continue to do what we’ve always done, we’ll continue to get what we’ve always gotten, and that means that the exodus of families and the exodus of business is going to continue and it’s going to increase.”

With the state already being home to among the highest state and local tax burdens in the country and the third highest state corporate income tax, Miller warns things may be poised to get worse before they get better.

In 2025, more than 108,000 Illinoisans left the workforce, lowering the state’s labor force participation rate from over 65% to a little more than 63% over a 12-month period, placing the state No. 35 in the country for overall job creation.