The Nashville, Tennessee, metropolitan area posted the lowest jobless rate among US metro areas with a population of 1 million or more in February, at 2.2%, the US Bureau of Labor Statistics reported today.

The Riverside-San Bernardino-Ontario area of California had the highest rate at 5.5%.

Overall, 38 large areas had over-the-year unemployment rate increases, nine had decreases and four had no change. The largest rate increase was in Seattle-Tacoma-Bellevue, Washington, which posted an increase of 1.3 percentage points to 4.7%. Conversely, the largest jobless rate decline occurred in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, down 0.8 percentage points to 3.6%.

Among metro areas of all sizes, the lowest unemployment rate in February was in Ames, Iowa, at 1.9%. The next lowest rate was in Burlington-South Burlington, Vermont, at 2.0%.

El Centro, California, had the highest jobless rate among metro areas of all sizes at 17.2%.