Fairfax County's unemployment rate ticked up to 3.4% in September, and the number of residents looking for work remains nearly 28% higher than before the second Trump administration began cutting the federal workforce, FFXnow first reported.
The figures land close to home for McLean, where federal contractors and government-adjacent professionals make up a large share of the workforce.
The Virginia Department of Workforce Development and Advancement reported the data Oct. 28. A total of 21,426 county residents were counted as unemployed, with 603,031 employed in the civilian workforce, according to FFXnow's analysis of the state figures.
A sharp jump from two years ago
September's 3.4% rate changed little from 3.3% a year earlier. But it was up significantly from 2.6% in September 2024, during the final months of the Biden administration, FFXnow reported.
That gap translates to a 27.8% increase in the raw number of unemployed county residents over two years, according to FFXnow's analysis of state data. The outlet attributed the rise to the Trump administration's downsizing of the federal workforce beginning in early 2025 and its related effects on the regional economy.
The county's total workforce has also shrunk. It dropped from 645,350 in September 2024 to 624,457 in September 2026, a decline of 3.3%, according to FFXnow. Some residents have left the workforce, moved to irregular jobs or moved out of the area entirely, the outlet reported.
Region hit hardest in the nation for job losses
The broader Washington metro area recorded the sharpest raw decline in nonfarm payroll employment of any metro area in the country, losing 61,000 jobs year-over-year in September, a 1.8% drop, according to U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) data released Oct. 28.
Keith Waters, an economist with George Mason University, told the Fairfax Times that the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) cuts hit federal contractors hard alongside direct government employees.
"The impacts of DOGE … it's one of, if not the biggest negative shock that our region has had in terms of total employment over the last, basically 100 years," Waters said.
Waters cautioned he was not ready to call the unemployment rate a declining trend, noting it can fall when people move away or retire rather than find new work. He said Fairfax County has held up reasonably well and that its rate remains below the national average of 4.1%.
Higher-income households feeling the squeeze
A Gallup and Greater Washington Community Foundation survey of 2,801 D.C.-area residents found that 58% of households earning $90,000 or more a year said they were impacted by the federal cuts, compared to 48% of lower-income households, as reported by WTOP. Only about half of D.C.-area residents now rate local job availability as "excellent" or "good," down from 65% in 2023.
All September 2026 figures are preliminary and not seasonally adjusted, according to FFXnow. The next round of state employment data, covering October, is scheduled for release Nov. 20.
