(02-02-18)
Total nonfarm payroll employment increased by 200,000 in January, and the unemployment rate was unchanged at 4.1 percent, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported today. Employment continued to trend up in construction, food services and drinking places, health care, and manufacturing. Household Survey Data: In January, the unemployment rate was 4.1 percent for the fourth consecutive month. The number of unemployed persons, at 6.7 million, changed little over the month. Among the major worker groups, the unemployment rate for Blacks increased to 7.7 percent in January, and the rate for Whites edged down to 3.5 percent.
The jobless rates for adult men (3.9 percent), adult women (3.6 percent), teenagers (13.9 percent), Asians (3.0 percent), and Hispanics (5.0 percent) showed little change. The number of long-term unemployed (those jobless for 27 weeks or more) was little changed at 1.4 million in January and accounted for 21.5 percent of the unemployed. The civilian labor force and total employment, as measured by the household survey, changed little in January (after accounting for the annual adjustments to the population controls). The labor force participation rate was 62.7 percent for the fourth consecutive month and the employment-population ratio was 60.1 percent for the third month in a row. The number of persons employed part time for economic reasons (sometimes referred to as involuntary part-time workers) was essentially unchanged at 5.0 million in January. These individuals, who would have preferred full-time employment, were working part time because their hours had been cut back or because they were unable to find a full-time job. In January, 1.7 million persons were marginally attached to the labor force, little changed from a year earlier. (The data are not seasonally adjusted.) These individuals were not in the labor force, wanted and were available for work, and had looked for a job sometime in the prior 12 months. They were not counted as unemployed because they had not searched for work in the 4 weeks preceding the survey. Among the marginally attached, there were 451,000 discouraged workers in January, little changed 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 1.2 million persons marginally attached to the labor force in January had not searched for work for reasons such as school attendance or family responsibilities.
