Florida's jobless rate drops to 8.7 percent

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. (AP) - State officials say Florida's unemployment rate dropped to 8.7 percent in April, but that was largely due to people leaving the labor force.
    
The Department of Economic Opportunity on Friday announced the jobless rate was the lowest it's been since January 2009.
    
It was a decline of 0.3 percentage points from March's 9 percent rate. That's still higher than the national jobless figure.
    
Federal officials earlier this month announced the national unemployment rate dropped from 8.2 percent to 8.1 percent in April. But that was mainly because more people gave up looking for work.
    
That's also what happened in Florida, where the civilian labor force declined by 28,000 workers in April.
    
Gov. Rick Scott, though, hailed the unemployment figures as good news.