U.S. Senator Rick Scott continues to call attention to an increasingly murky job picture in the Sunshine State, urging state leaders to get back to work putting Floridians back to work.

“Unfortunately, this morning’s jobs numbers confirm what I have been sounding the alarm on for months, and what many Florida families are already feeling — Florida is falling behind on jobs,” Scott posted to social media, along with a graphic showing a 1.1% increase in the unemployment rate year over year and a net loss of almost 38,000 jobs over the same period.

“We’re losing tens of thousands of jobs every month and our unemployment is behind the national average AGAIN. Something needs to change. There needs to be a relentless focus on growing our economy, recruiting more job creators, and getting Florida BACK TO WORK,” Scott said.

Scott’s comments come one day after House Speaker Daniel Perez voiced dismay about increasing unemployment in the state in the last stretch of the Ron DeSantis era, noting that never happened under the former two-term Governor.

Scott’s single-minded focus on jobs was a feature of his time as Governor from 2011 to 2019.

By the time he left office, the unemployment rate had fallen from nearly 11% when he was inaugurated to 3.3%, a point below the national average. 1.7 million jobs were created when he was Governor, and the state’s job growth rate was 3.3% by the end.

Meanwhile, as DeSantis’ time in office approaches an end, joblessness is climbing. The unemployment rate of 4.7% is higher than the national average of 4.3%.

The latest FloridaCommerce data shows more than half of the 25 metropolitan areas tracked for employment data saw decreases year to year. There were 14 metro areas where the number of jobs slipped, with the Fort Lauderdale area leading the way with a 1% decline, or a loss of 9,300 jobs. The West Palm Beach and Jacksonville metro areas had the next-highest year-to-year job declines, respectively.

Scott repeatedly has lamented the recent trajectory.

“This is concerning. Florida’s jobs numbers continue to get worse. Unemployment shot up to 4.7% — higher than the national average. Florida lost almost 38K jobs year over year in March,” Scott posted to social media Friday.

“Florida’s unemployment rate is ABOVE the national average, and it’s only GROWING. The latest state jobs numbers show we lost over 43k jobs all in critical industries. Florida had one of the worst-performing job markets over the past year. Our state needs to stay focused on adding private sector jobs and driving down the cost of living — just like President (Donald) Trump is trying to do across the country,” he posted last month to X.

“Higher costs of living in Florida are driving people away from the state. That’s bad for Floridians, bad for business, and bad for everyone. This, on the heels of last month’s jobs numbers, is incredibly discouraging,” Scott also posted in April, responding to a Wall Street Journal article.

“If you don’t have a growing job economy, then your revenues don’t grow. And so that makes it harder. When your revenue’s growing, it’s a lot easier to reduce your taxes, which is what I was able to do. We grew 1.7 million jobs when I was Governor. So what that did was, we got more revenues. And every year revenues came in, I cut more and more taxes, and that’s one thing the state needs to do,” Scott said during an interview with WFLA’s Ryan Gorman in January.

A legislative briefing from the Office of Economic and Demographic Research (EDR) on the state’s long-term economic outlook last year offered further clarity on the long-term impact of evaporating employment opportunities.

Job creation is expected to be just above 1% per year, with an increasingly older population creating further stress on the state.

An analysis from Florida TaxWatch further details a bleak forecast. The report projects Florida’s unemployment rate increasing from 3.9% in 2025 to a peak of 4.4% in 2027, before stabilizing around 4% by 2035.

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Drew Dixon contributed reporting.

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