The Baltimore metropolitan area recorded the lowest jobless rate in July, 1.7%, among the 51 largest US metro areas with populations of 1 million or more, the US Bureau for Labor Statistics reported Aug. 30.

Baltimore also registered the largest decline in jobless rate among all large metro areas, falling 1.7 percentage points.

Las Vegas posted the highest jobless rate among large metros during the same period at 6.1%. The biggest percentage increase occurred in California’s San Jose-Sunnyvale-Santa Clara area, which posted an increase of  0.9 of a percentage point to a 3.6% jobless rate.

Among metro areas of all sizes, the lowest unemployment rate in July was in the Sioux Falls, South Dakota, area at 1.4%. The next-lowest rates were in Burlington, Vermont, at 1.5%, and Rapid City, South Dakota, at 1.6%.

The metro area with the highest jobless rate was El Centro, California, at 17.7%.