Michigan’s unemployment rate has grown faster than every state in the nation over the last year, and it’s only getting worse.

An analysis of unemployment claims across the country found the number in Michigan jumped 128.34% last week over the week prior, while the figure was 122.23% higher than the same week last year, according to the personal finance website WalletHub.

That put Michigan dead last on the site’s list of States Where Unemployment Claims Are Decreasing the Most at a time when new claims nationally are down 5.4%.

“Every state had unemployment claims last week that were lower than in the previous week except for Michigan, New Hampshire, Maryland, Alaska, Minnesota, Oregon, Virginia, Ohio, Washington, Indiana, Florida, Illinois, Texas, California, Colorado, West Virginia, North Carolina, Kansas and the District of Columbia,” WalletHub reports.

The analysis included a look at all 50 states and the District of Columbia based on changes in unemployment claims for several key weeks, as well as the number of claims per 100,000 people in the labor force.

Michigan ranked 51^st for both the increase in claims last week versus the week prior, as well as claims per 100,000 people in the labor force.

Michigan’s 128.34% jump in claims last week was astronomically higher than all other states, with the next closest increase in New Hampshire at 81.05%. Others among the top 10 biggest increases include Maryland at 30.38%, Alaska at 21.73%, Minnesota at 11.68%, District of Columbia at 10.31%, Oregon at 10.26%, Virginia at 9.46%, Ohio at 9.23%, and Washington at 9.05%.

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It’s the same situation with the 122.23% increase in Michigan claims last week versus the same week in 2024.

A look at the change in claims year to date versus the same last year showed only Kentucky and the District of Columbia have increased more than Michigan.

The data shows 242 Michiganders are unemployed for every 100,000 in the labor force, the worst in the nation, ahead of California at 218, DC at 192, Alaska and Oregon at 190, New Jersey at 177, New York and Pennsylvania at 150, Nevada at 148, and Hawaii at 143.

The WalletHub analysis, coupled with data from the U.S. Department of Labor, suggests Michigan is on course to highest unemployment rate in the country, continuing what has been 12 months of increases in the Great Lakes State.

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Michigan’s unemployment growth is outpacing every other state by a wide margin, with its 5.5% jobless rate for March marking a 1.3 percentage point increase over the last year.

The trend equates to 69,000 more Michiganders out of a job than in March 2024, putting Michigan’s unemployment rate second only to Nevada’s 5.7% for the highest rate in the nation. Nevada’s weekly claims declined by 6.61% last week, according to WalletHub.

Michigan lost 5,000 manufacturing jobs in March alone, 4,000 in professional and business services, and another 1,000 in the construction industry. The roughly 10,000 lost jobs were offset some by a gain of 2,000 government jobs, and 1,000 each in retail, financial, leisure and hospitality, and other services, for a net loss of 5,000 for March.

“One culprit is the Biden Administration’s electric vehicle mandate, which has caused thousands of auto-industry layoffs. Michigan has been shedding manufacturing jobs since summer 2023 and has lost about 13,000 in the last year,” the Wall Street Journal noted in an April editorial. “This month General Motors said it would temporarily cut 200 jobs at its EV factory in Detroit amid slowing demand.”

Other economic struggles in Michigan stem from policies imposed by the state’s first Democratic government trifecta in 40 years, which voters killed by electing a Republican House majority in November.

“Gov. Gretchen Whitmer and Democratic lawmakers created a hostile business environment after taking complete control of the statehouse in 2023. They repealed the state’s right-to-work law that gave workers a choice of whether to join a union and imposed prevailing-wage mandates that shut out non-union contractors from state-funded construction projects,” according to the Journal.

“To pay for more transfer payments, Democrats last year raised the state’s flat income tax rate to 4.25% from 4.05%,” the editorial read. “Ms. Whitmer recently pitched raising the corporate rate from 8% from 6%. Nearly 90% of businesses that would be affected employ fewer than 100 workers.”

In recent weeks, the Democratic governor has continued to insist on the tax increase to fulfill her 2019 campaign promise to “fix the damn roads,” despite warnings from the Detroit Regional Chamber her proposed tax hike “penalizes the entire economy and creates a new challenge for doing business in Michigan,” according to MLive.

Whitmer’s push to increase taxes comes despite a Republican plan to steer $3.1 billion toward the state’s $3.9 billion annual road funding shortfall that cleared the lower chamber 50 days ago.

Last week, a seven-member state commission appointed by Whitmer called on Michiganders to give the governor and other top elected officials, including lawmakers, a 25% raise, the Detroit Free Press reports.