Total nonfarm payroll employment increased by 171,000 in October, and the unemployment rate increased at 7.9%, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported today. Employment rose in professional and business services, health care, and retail trade. The change in total nonfarm payroll employment for August was revised from +142,000 to +192,000, and the change for September was revised from +114,000 to +148,000.
So with this report another 255,000 (171 + 50 + 34) were added, quite a good number. If we could see 250,000 jobs added for 12 more months that would be quite nice – though still will not have recovered all the jobs cost by the too-big-too-fail credit crisis.
Employment growth has averaged 157,000 per month thus far in 2012, about the same as the average monthly gain of 153,000 in 2011.
Hurricane Sandy had no discernable effect on the employment and unemployment data for October. Household survey data collection was completed before the storm, and establishment survey data collection rates were within normal ranges nationally and for the affected areas.
Long-term unemployment remains a problem, in October, the number of long-term unemployed (those jobless for 27 weeks or more) was little changed at 5.0 million. These individuals accounted for 40.6% of the unemployed (a higher percentage than normal – as it has been for the duration of the too-big-too-fail job recession.
The civilian labor force rose by 578,000 to 155.6 million in October, and the labor force participation rate edged up to 63.8%. Total employment rose by 410,000 over the month (I am guessing this is not seasonally adjusted – the highlighted figures normally quotes are seasonally adjusted figures). The employment-population ratio was essentially unchanged at 58.8%, following an increase of 40 basis points in September.
Related: Unemployment Rate Reached 10.2% (Oct 2009) – USA Economy Adds 151,000 Jobs in October and Revisions Add 110,000 More (Oct 2010, unemployment rate at 9.6%) – USA Unemployment Rate Drops to 8.6% (Nov 2011) – USA Lost Over 500,000 Jobs in November, 2008
Health care added 31,000 jobs in October. Over the past year, employment in health care has risen by 296,000.
Manufacturing employment changed little in October. Since April of this year manufacturing employment has shown little change. Manufacturing output has been raising and if we sustain the recovery I would not be surprised to see jobs added in manufacturing, which is not a common result in the last few decades.
In October, the average workweek for all employees on private nonfarm payrolls was 34.4 hours for the fourth consecutive month. The manufacturing workweek edged down by 0.1 hour to 40.5 hours, and factory overtime was unchanged at 3.2 hours. The average workweek for production and nonsupervisory employees on private nonfarm payrolls edged down by 0.1 hour to 33.6 hours.
In October, average hourly earnings for all employees on private nonfarm payrolls edged
down by 1 cent to $23.58. Over the past 12 months, average hourly earnings have risen
by 1.6%.
The huge federal deficient and continued extreme actions by the fed to bail out too-big-too-fail financial institution are serious problems. But the short term effect on the job market in the USA has been fairly amazing. It is amazing we were able to restrain the impact of the extremely bad policies that created the huge mess and led to over 10% unemployment and the shedding over over half a million jobs a month for several months this effectively (even with the huge debt and worrisome actions by the fed).
We can’t continue to provide huge benefits to too-big-fail institutions and allow massive speculation backstopped by fed bailouts on top of huge federal deficits. I am very worried about the long term consequences of the current policy but it has been more successful in the short term than anyone had the right to sensibly hope for (even though plenty of people hoped for even better results). Those optimists, I think, failed to appreciate the dire straits we got ourselves into. And people continue to downplay the dangers caused by the continued massive actions by the Fed and huge deficits.