By Monica Chen

mchen@heraldsun.com; 419-6636

DURHAM — Unemployment rates ballooned to record highs for Durham County and Wake County in January.

Durham County’s rate jumped to 8.6 percent from 7.9 percent the previous month, 2-tenths of a percentage point higher than the county’s previous record, 8.4 percent seen last June and July.

In Wake County, the jobless rate climbed to 9.2 percent in January from 8.4 percent in December, also breaking the previous record 8.8 percent set last summer.

The unemployment rates are the highest the area has seen since the 1970s, when the statistics were nationally standardized.

Unemployment rates increased in 99 of North Carolina’s 100 counties in January, according to new data released by the state’s Employment Security Commission on Friday.

Orange County, with 6.9 percent for January, had the lowest unemployment rate in the state. The county’s record high is still 7.1 percent, set last July.

In Graham County, which had the highest jobless rate in the state, nearly 1 in 5 workers were without jobs in January. The county on the Tennessee border saw a 1.7 percentage-point increase from the previous month to 19.3 percent.

The ESC counted 80,758 people unemployed in the Triangle in January.

The Durham-Chapel Hill Metropolitan Statistical Area had 22,070 people without jobs. The Raleigh-Cary MSA counted 52,839 jobless.