Iowa payroll jobs dropped for the second time in the first four months of 2018, the Iowa Policy Project reports. In April, the state lost 1,300 payroll jobs, leaving Iowa a net loss of 500 jobs so far in 2018, Executive Director Mike Owen said. Iowa’s current unemployment rate remains at 2.8 percent. “Over the year, jobs are up 10,300 — a weak pace for the economy at only about 900 jobs per month,” Owen said. “To put our recent growth in context, Iowa needs 1,500 net new jobs each month for the next three years just to catch the pace of population growth and have jobs where they stood before the last recession started in late 2007 — over 10 years ago.”