The unemployment rate in Nevada fell to its lowest rate in nearly six years in May. The latest report from the Nevada Department of Employment, Training and Rehabilitation also reveals the construction industry showed the greatest rate of year-over-year employment gains of any in the state.

Nevada’s unemployment rate dropped under 8% to 7.9% in May, adding 2,400 jobs during the month, on a seasonally-adjusted basis. The state added 29,400 jobs from May 2013 to May 2014.

Construction industry employment grew by 12.5% in the last year, adding 7,000 jobs to a seasonally-adjusted 63,200 jobs in May 2014. This is the highest level of employment in the industry since January 2010 as the “construction industry experienced the highest job growth rate of any super-sector” during the past year, according to DETR. The industry added 500 jobs during the month of May 2014.

The DETR report also shows that employment by Specialty Trade Contractors in the state increased 600 from April 2014 and 200 since last May, to 38,800.

In Clark County, the industry added 2,500 jobs since May 2013 and 200 since the prior month. However, employment by Specialty Trade Contractors in the County declined by 200 in May 2014 and fell 1,200 from May 2013 to May 2014.

In Washoe and Storey Counties the construction industry added 1,100 jobs during the previous year and 500 since April 2014.

County and Specialty Trade Contractor data are not seasonally adjusted.

Jobs are not the only element that has been increasing in the state.

[T]he number of employers in Nevada is on the rise. In fact, at 59,300 in this year’s first quarter, the number of employers participating in the State’s Unemployment Insurance Program, stands 3.1 percent higher than a year ago. This represents the most pronounced advance since the first quarter of 2008. All told, gains have been recorded in each of the past 11 quarters.

But, as with some of the sub-sector data, some of the news is mixed.

Nevada continues to experience a higher unemployment rate than the nation, which stands 1.6 percentage points lower than Nevada, at 6.3 percent. However, the gap between Nevada’s rate and that of the US is the smallest it has been since August of 2008. Further, the number of unemployed persons in the Silver State is down by nearly 19,000, to 108,000, relative to May of 2013, a decline of 14.7 percent.

A copy of the employment report can be downloaded here. The original release from DETR inadvertently included some pages from an earlier report instead of this month’s data pages. The document linked here has been corrected for this error.