The Daily Freeman is reporting unemployment rates in counties throughout the Mid-Hudson Valley and Catskills were approximately a full percentage point lower last month than a year earlier, according to state Department of Labor data released October 23. In Greene County, the jobless rate was 3.7 percent, down from 4.8 percent in September 2017. The unemployment rate last month in Columbia County was 2.8 percent, the lowest in the state. In September 2017, the county had a 3.6 percent jobless rate. Ulster and Dutchess counties each had an unemployment rate of 3.4 percent, down from 4.4 percent the previous year, the department said. The statewide jobless rate in September 2018 was 3.8 percent, down from 4.6 percent in September 2017. Read the full story in the Daily Freeman.