November’s BLS report is tepid, October’s payroll numbers are still standing
It’s the first Friday of the month, which means that I get to spoil you all with a recap of November’s employment situation report. I know, I know, I’m excited too, but try to contain your enthusiasm for a bit, because I’ve got some work to do right now.
Last month, I promised that my post for November would be extra long and insightful if the initial payroll numbers for October made it through the month unrevised; so this is the part where I eat my words, sort of. The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics released its payroll numbers for November right on time this morning, and overall, the report was solid. U.S. employment continued to rise last month, with the country adding another 94,000 jobs overall.
As some of you may already know, the BLS can be a little revision-happy at times, so I assumed that the numbers for October (released on Nov. 2) would have changed by the time that the November report was drafted. And I was right. It was initially reported that the country gained 166,000 jobs in October, but the latest employment situation report reveals that we added 170,000 positions. This, of course, is a good thing, because I assumed that the numbers would go down. Lucky for us, we actually gained 4,000 more jobs than the BLS initially estimated.
Score for U.S. payroll employment: 1, Score for Suzy: 0
The real estate and credit markets have been taking a toll on the economy, and we haven’t had employment increases topping 100,000 jobs very often over the past few months, so October is hopefully a sign of good things to come.
Although the numbers for October held strong over the month, it appears that payroll employment for September has been revised again. The employment situation report for October placed September’s payroll growth at 96,000 new positions, but November’s report cut this number in half, with revised numbers indicating that the country only gained 44,000 jobs in September. Confused yet? It’s okay.
Basically all you need to know is that job growth trended up slightly in September, a whole lot in October, and a solid amount in November. If we keep this pace up, we’ll gain an average of 100,000 jobs a month, which isn’t as strong as what we were averaging toward the beginning of the year (147,000 positions a month), but it’s acceptable given the circumstances.
Aside from the monthly gains and revisions, some interesting things happened within the industries themselves in November. As I mentioned above, the nation added 94,000 jobs overall this past month. Health care and food services both contributed to this increase, but not as much as you would think. The health care industry has been adding an average of 34,000 jobs each month over the past year, but positions in this sector only increased by 15,000 in November. Food services and drinking places have been posting similar numbers to health care since the summer, but the industry only gained 17,000 jobs this past month.
Social assistance increased by 10,000 positions in November, jobs in accommodations were up 11,000, and employment in professional and technical services (e.g., computer systems design, management and consulting services) grew by 24,000 positions. The retail trade industry also brightened the overall employment picture for the nation, adding 24,000 jobs in clothing stores, health and personal care stores, and electronics and home furnishing stores.
The losses that occurred over the course of November were related mostly to home building and financing. Construction employment suffered a loss of 24,000 positions, the manufacturing industry cut 11,000 jobs, and credit intermediation lost another 13,000. Real estate employment declined by 8,000 positions last month as well.
In terms of wages and hours, the workweek remained unchanged in November (at 33.8 hours) and earnings increased by an average of eight cents an hour (or 0.5 percent). The latter number is a noticeable increase over previous months and leaves the average weekly earnings of American workers at $595.89.
That’s about all that I found to be of interest when I scanned the BLS report this morning. I think I lived up to my end of the bargain, because I know this post was long and, hopefully for you, insightful. Until next time, I’m sure we’ll be dreaming about the employment situation reports together. (Okay, maybe not you, but I very well could be.)