"Total nonfarm payroll employment increased by 156,000 in August, and the unemployment rate was little changed at 4.4 percent, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported today. Job gains occurred in manufacturing, construction, professional and technical services, health care, and mining. Household Survey Data In August, the unemployment rate, at 4.4 percent, and the number of unemployed persons, at 7.1 million, were little changed. After declining earlier in the year, the unemployment rate has been either 4.3 or 4.4 percent since April. (See table A-1.)" Total nonfarm payroll employment increased by 156,000 in August. Job gains occurred in manufacturing, construction, professional and technical services, health care, and mining. Employment growth has averaged 176,000 per month thus far this year, about in line with the average monthly gain of 187,000 in 2016. (See table B-1.) Manufacturing employment rose by 36,000 in August. Job gains occurred in motor vehicles and parts (+14,000), fabricated metal products (+5,000), and computer and electronic products (+4,000). Manufacturing has added 155,000 jobs since a recent employment low in November 2016. In August, construction employment rose by 28,000, after showing little change over the prior 5 months. Employment among residential specialty trade contractors edged up by 12,000 over the month. Employment in professional and technical services continued to trend up in August (+22,000) and has grown by 262,000 over the last 12 months. In August, job gains occurred in computer systems design and related services (+8,000). Health care employment continued on an upward trend over the month (+20,000) and has risen by 328,000 over the year. Employment in hospitals edged up over the month (+6,000). Mining continued to add jobs in August (+7,000), with all of the growth in support activities for mining. Since a recent low in October 2016, employment in mining has risen by 62,000, or 10 percent. Employment in food services and drinking places changed little in August (+9,000), following an increase of 53,000 in July. Over the year, the industry has added 283,000 jobs. Among the marginally attached, there were 448,000 discouraged workers in August, down 128,000 from a year earlier. (The data are not seasonally adjusted.) Discouraged workers are persons not currently looking for work because they believe no jobs are available for them. The remaining 1.1 million persons marginally attached to the labor force in August had not searched for work for reasons such as school attendance or family responsibilities." In August, average hourly earnings for all employees on private nonfarm payrolls rose by 3 cents to $26.39, after rising by 9 cents in July. Over the past 12 months, average hourly earnings have increased by 65 cents, or 2.5 percent. In August, average hourly earnings of private-sector production and nonsupervisory employees increased by 4 cents to $22.12. (See tables B-3 and B-8.) https://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.nr0.htm Sorry I just don't see "lousy" here. Feel free to point it out.
The actual UE is a little over 10%, and the job creation per month is barely (and at times not that) keeping up with replacement jobs. We are nearing 100 million out of the job force, who are no longer looking for work. A major recession/depression is coming.
I could care less how the BLS spins it...they work for the government and are supervised by the White House. Of course the numbers will sound good in their press releases. I will ask again, if a month that saw at least 74,000 less people employed (far more non-seasonally adjusted) and the employed saw their weekly wages drop is not a lousy month...what would you call it then?
According to the BLS report employment remained stable overall and went up in sectors like mining and construction which are good paying jobs.
No he tried to change the subject from my initial comment on the BLS report with stats from who knows where now didn't he.
His stats were correct. The real UE is over 10% and we are nearing 100 million out of work and we are heading for another Great Recession.
you would think that with the economy in the dumps it would be easy to hit 3% post crash. After all it would be 3% of a much smaller number
we are headed for another crash because of credit card debt and student loan debt. The US economy runs on consumer spending. If you restrict the ability of people to do that because they are overindebted then you get a recession.
Actually, the low labor force participation rate was one of the main tools for conservatives to dismiss the economy under Obama. Then, they said the official unemployment numbers were fake. Now, all of a sudden trump fans don't care about the labor force participation rate anymore and the official unemployment numbers are fine and dandy, despite their president claiming that real unemployment was >40% during the campaign. Of course, the Dems are no better reversing their arguments after Trump became president. The reality (outside of partisan hackery) is, labor force participation is still low, wages are still depressed, and the "Trump boom" has only manifested in a short-lived boost in the stock price (which is probably now over-valued). All other economic fundamentals remain the same. And why should they change in 6 months when the US economy is a behemoth that has enough inertia to only change at snail's pace.
Oh I see your trick, you cherry picked one statistic that shows the results of baby boomers retiring in mass and attempt to make that into bad economic numbers.