KTRE.com Lufkin and Nacogdoches |Lufkin job market

Lufkin job market

by Christa Lollis

LUFKIN, TX (KTRE) - Laqueshia Thompson, a recent high school graduate, has been spending hours on the internet every day looking for jobs.

She's been searching for a month but isn't getting very far. "Most of them are like part time jobs really it's only like 15 or 20 hours a week. That's not really nothing that's gonna help you pay bills or car note or insurance."

And while unemployment rates are down that could be changing. Out of a group of local employers surveyed, 10 percent said they would soon reduce their work force but 13 percent said they want to hire more people.

Laqueshia just hopes the jobs that are added aren't temporary positions. "You don't know if you're going to have a job after that 3 months is over. Really it's like challenge cause you have to live like day to day wondering if you're going to have a job the next day." And living paycheck to paycheck isn't something she wants to do.

So if she doesn't find a job soon she's planning on putting her job search on hold. Laqueshia says she will, "Go to school and then I can see what I get from there because right now being out of high school having a diploma, it's not helping at all and then some of the food places are even starting to ask for diplomas now."

The survey showed the best fields to go into right now are manufacturing and retail trade but overall the number of companies decreasing their staff has gone up since last year.