CHICAGO – Unemployment rates jumped in the Sauk Valley last month, but remained lower than they were a year earlier, according to statistics released Friday by the Illinois Department of Employment Security.

Jobless rate increases from November to December ranged from 1.2 percentage points in Carroll County to 0.7 percentage points in Whiteside and Lee counties.

In those counties, along with Ogle and Bureau counties, the number of people recorded as being part of the labor force dropped slightly, while the number of people unemployed increased.