Total nonfarm payroll employment rose by 143,000 in January, and the unemployment rate edged down to 4.0 percent, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported today. Job gains occurred in health care, retail trade, and social assistance. Employment declined in the mining, quarrying, and oil and gas extraction industry. This news release presents statistics from two monthly surveys. The household survey measures labor force status, including unemployment, by demographic characteristics. The establishment survey measures nonfarm employment, hours, and earnings by industry. For more information about the concepts and statistical methodology used in these two surveys, see the Technical Note. Household Survey Data – The unemployment rate edged down to 4.0 percent in January, after accounting for the annual adjustments to the population controls. The number of unemployed people, at 6.8 million, changed little over the month. Among the major worker groups, the unemployment rates for adult men (3.7 percent), adult women (3.7 percent), teenagers (11.8 percent), Whites (3.5 percent), Blacks (6.2 percent), Asians (3.7 percent), and Hispanics (4.8 percent) showed little or no change in January. The number of long-term unemployed (those jobless for 27 weeks or more), at 1.4 million, changed little in January. The long-term unemployed accounted for 21.1 percent of all unemployed people. In January, both the labor force participation rate (62.6 percent) and the employment-population ratio (60.1 percent) were unchanged, after accounting for the annual adjustments to the population controls. Both measures have been relatively flat in recent months. The number of people employed part time for economic reasons, at 4.5 million, changed little in January. These individuals would have preferred full-time employment but were working part time because their hours had been reduced or they were unable to find full-time jobs. The number of people not in the labor force who currently want a job, at 5.5 million, was little changed in January. These individuals were not counted as unemployed because they were not actively looking for work during the 4 weeks preceding the survey or were unavailable to take a job. Among those not in the labor force who wanted a job, the number of people marginally attached to the labor force, at 1.6 million, was essentially unchanged in January. These individuals wanted and were available for work and had looked for a job sometime in the prior 12 months but had not looked for work in the 4 weeks preceding the survey. The number of discouraged workers, a subset of the marginally attached who believed that no jobs were available for them, changed little at 592,000 in January.
The Employment Situation (02-07-25)
- Economic Monthly Summaries, The Employment Situation
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