Washington's economy surged forward in July with employers adding 12,800 jobs, more than half created in the Seattle metro area.

The statewide jobless rate also edged up to 5.7 percent in July from 5.5 percent the previous month as the unemployed resumed their job search and were once again counted in the labor force.

"The rise in unemployment is a direct result of the exceptionally good hiring picture," Roberta Pauer, a regional economist with the state Employment Security Department, said in her monthly analysis.

The recovery already has some employers scrambling for workers. The health-care industry added 1,800 jobs in the Seattle area last month, contributing to the growing number of unfilled jobs in that industry. In May, health care had 14,000 open positions, according to a state survey.

The shortage of skilled nurses has created a job market as competitive as the tech run-up in the late 1990s. Evergreen Healthcare in Kirkland is offering signing bonuses of up to $10,000 for hard-to-fill jobs.

The signing bonuses, paid out over two years, are less costly than hiring temp nurses through staffing agencies, spokeswoman Amy Gepner said.

The hot construction market and rebounding manufacturing sector are also tightening the supply of skilled labor. Despite a weakness in the Seattle area last month, the construction industry statewide added 2,400 jobs in July.

Where the jobs are


Hiring is picking up in the Seattle area, which gained 6,900 jobs in July. Some examples:

Wholesale trade +1,500

Professional and business services +900

Manufacturing +800

Leisure and hospitality +600

Source: Roberta Pauer, regional economist, Washington state Employment Security Department

Manufacturing was helped by Boeing, which has recalled 3,600 machinists in the past three months. Many of those workers were among the 30,000 laid off during the company's rolling job cuts four years ago after 9/11, and had taken interim work at machine shops.

Now those smaller shops must hire their replacements, said Beth Madden, whose Renton business, Madden Industrial Craftsmen, recruits workers for construction and manufacturing.

Competition for experienced laborers is such that Madden has created a "mobile recruiting unit" — a 32-foot recreational vehicle that travels the Puget Sound area interviewing job candidates on the spot.

Madden converted the MRU, as she calls it, into a rolling office, complete with computer stations for applicant tests and a private room for interviews.

The RV may park in a shopping-center lot one day and a state employment office the next. Recruiters interview between 15 and 20 applicants a week in it.

"As the job market tightens, people are looking at ways to be a little more creative," Madden says. "Right now we have more jobs than people."

Washington has added 119,100 jobs in the past two years — 54,200 more than were lost in the 2001-03 recession.

Seattle employers added 6,900 jobs in July, bringing the gains during the past two years to 64,800 — about 34,000 jobs shy of pre-recession levels.

Local unemployment also rose, to 4.9 percent from 4.7 percent last month.

Pauer cautioned against celebrating July's figures too much, however, since part of the job growth came in education, where seasonal variations can play havoc with statistics. Without counting those jobs, July's growth still exceeds forecasts of 5,000 new jobs per month.

The recovery has also changed the landscape for job hunters, particularly those with experience who have suddenly gone from seeker to sought-after.

Greg Dahlman, a computer-storage system designer, turned down several job offers in hopes of finding a company that offered a short commute and had a good work environment.

He had seven interviews scheduled the week he accepted a position as a senior storage administrator for the Walt Disney Internet Group's Seattle office.

This climate is a sharp contrast to 2001, when the tech downturn left thousands of experienced information-technology workers unemployed. So few companies were hiring back then that Dahlman moved to California to work.

"Finally the job market improved enough that I could return to the Northwest," he says. "A friend just took a job, and he got a signing bonus. That's the first time I've heard of that since 2000."

Shirleen Holt: 206-464-8316 or sholt@seattletimes.com