The number of county residents on the unemployment line swelled by 5,000 last year as jobs continued to disappear in a struggling economy, according to state numbers released yesterday.

The Maryland Department of Labor and Licensing said that 17,890 Anne Arundel County residents were out of work at the end of December. While that's slightly better than the peak months of June and July, it still is a whopping 34 percent increase in the number of people out of work from a year ago.

Kirkland Murray, director of the Anne Arundel Workforce Development Corp., said the people looking for work form a more diverse group than ever...