Arlington’s unemployment rate continued its upward trajectory in June, reaching a 55% year-over-year increase, according to new data.
A total of 5,247 county residents were reported as seeking work that month, according to state data released earlier this week. That’s up from the 3,380 residents reported as unemployed in June 2024, and up from 5,061 recorded in May of this year.
This is Arlington’s highest unemployment rate since July 2021, during the pandemic.
In neighboring Falls Church, 333 residents were reported as seeking work in June. This represented a 50% increase from 222 job seekers a year before.
It’s the highest total since 361 were tallied in August 2020.
The non-seasonally-adjusted Arlington jobless rate in June was 3.4%, up from 2.2% a year before. In Falls Church, the rate of 4% was up from 2.6% a year before.
The jobs picture has emerged as a key issue in both state and local political races this fall.
Northern Virginia’s innermost suburbs — Arlington, Alexandria and Falls Church — seem to be some of the hardest hit in terms of job losses, owing at least in part to federal staffing cutbacks.
In Fairfax County, which straddles the inner and outer suburbs, the unemployment rate was up 32%: increasing from 2.7% in June 2024 to 3.6% in June 2025, for the highest total since September 2021.
June was the fourth consecutive month where more than 20,000 Fairfax County residents were seeking work.
Statewide, the 176,958 people reported as seeking work represented an increase of 25% from 141,483 a year before. The statewide unemployment rate stood at 3.9%, up from 3.1% a year before.
All figures represent non-seasonally-adjusted figures.
Using seasonally adjusted figures, state employment officials reported that the number of Virginia residents employed by the federal government declined from 193,300 in June 2024 to 185,500 in June 2025.
Total nonfarm employment in the commonwealth rose 35,000 year-over-year to 4,268,300, with the bulk of the increase (28,100) coming in the private sector.
The commonwealth’s labor-force participation rate decreased by 0.2 percentage points to 65% in June. The participation rate measures the proportion of the civilian population age 16 and older that is employed or actively looking for work.
The Virginia Department of Workforce Development and Advancement continues to revamp its Local Area Unemployment Statistics (LAUS) website. While statewide data can be found through June on the site, locality data currently stops at April.
It will updated when the upgrade is complete, state officials told ARLnow.
