RALEIGH  — North Carolina's unemployment rate climbed to 11.1 percent in May — hitting a new peak since the state started such measurements more than three decades ago, the state Employment Security Commission said Friday.

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The number of unemployed North Carolinians topped 500,000 — an all-time high. The state's jobless rate a year ago was 5.9 percent.

Just six states had higher unemployment rates in May, with Michigan leading the country at 14.1 percent in May and South Carolina fourth at 12.1 percent. Forty-eight states and Washington, D.C., recorded unemployment rate increases in May compared to April.

"While we continue to have job announcements in areas across North Carolina, we are still experiencing some job losses in many job sectors, this also being seen across the country," ESC Chairman Moses Carey said.

After a long run in which government employment had some of the best job security, the sector shed 4,000 employees in May. Manufacturing continued to suffer as companies cut 3,800 workers.

Since the start of the recession in December 2007, North Carolina's manufacturing companies have cut nearly 16 percent of their work force.

Hotels, amusement parks and other companies in the leisure and hospitality sector added 2,900 jobs in the buildup to summer.

William Hall, an economist at the University of North Carolina at Wilmington and director of its Center for Business and Economics Service, said with the federal government hiring census workers and others, the drop in government jobs means the recession's falling tax revenues is forcing local and state governments to shed a surprising number of workers.

North Carolina's jobless rate has been higher than the national level for all but one month since early 2007, months before the national recession officially began, Hall said.

The early start and the continuing high level of unemployment is the result of North Carolina's concentration on hard-hit fields like financial services, manufacturing, construction and real estate development, he said.

Major Singh, 62, of Cary, has been unemployed since the Durham window manufacturer where he worked for three years closed in November. The immigrant from India has worked in assembly jobs for more than a decade, but he's having a hard time competing for similar jobs since his age makes it harder to lift and pack, Singh said Friday.

The long recession has stymied white-collar as well as manual workers.

Farrukh Aquil, 41, of Cary, said he's been looking for work as a semiconductor design engineer since December, when German memory-chip maker Qimonda AG shut its local design center. He's had some telephone interviews with potential employers, but no offers yet.

"I think the market is so saturated that even if you are 90 percent right, they (employers) will keep looking until they find someone who meets 110 percent of their needs," Aquil said.