While the chart above shows ADP and the Bureau of Labor Statistics closely meshing in measuring
private-sector job growth, the close count is often due to ADP's subsequent revisions.
President Obama might make an exception for the Bureau of Labor Statistics to issue its jobs report for September on Friday. Or he might not.
Like other data-collecting government agencies, from the Census Bureau to the Centers for Disease Control, the BLS has gone dark for the duration of the federal shutdown.
Thus, the monthly job report of Automated Data Processing may be all we see for the time being. ADP reported Wednesday morning that, seasonally adjusted, 166,000 new private-sector jobs were added last month. That was 10,000 below what the consensus of analysts had forecast earlier this week. It was also 10,000 fewer than the 176,000 jobs ADP originally reported for August. The August report has been revised downward to 159,000.
Though it is not nearly as good a measure of job creation as the BLS provides—and only covers the private sector—ADP's report usually shows the same trend as the BLS report. The New Jersey-based ADP provides payroll processing, human resource and benefit administration services to some 600,000 clients worldwide.
Of the report for September, Carlos A. Rodriguez, president and chief executive officer of ADP, said, “As in previous months, most of the job gains occurred in the service-providing sector.”
ADP collaborates with Moody's Analytics in producing its job report. Mark Zandi, chief economist of Moody's Analytics, said: "The job market appears to have softened in recent months. Fiscal austerity has begun to take a toll on job creation."
Last month, the BLS reported that the economy had gained a seasonally adjusted 152,000 private-sector jobs for August and 17,000 government jobs for a total of 169,000. In addition to that gain, the BLS revised the gains it had previously counted in June and July downward by 74,000 jobs. The consensus announced earlier this week for the bureau's September report was for a gain of 178,000 private- and public-sector jobs. But the consensus was well off the mark for August. In fact, the consensus misses more than half the time.
Among the details in the ADP report:
• Service-sector jobs: +147,000
• Manufacturing: +1,000
• Financial services: -4,000 jobs.
• Businesses employing between one and 49 workers added 74,000 jobs in September. Businesses of between 50 and 499 workers added 28,000 jobs. Businesses with 500 or more employees hired 64,000 workers.
9:52 AM PT: Comparison of the past seven months between the ADP report and the BLS report of private-sector job creation. This is based on the original (unrevised) reports released the first week of each month for 2013. ADP is listed first.
February: 198,000 v. 246,000
March: 158,000 v. 95,000
April: 119,000 v. 176,000
May: 135,000 v. 178,000
June: 188,000 v. 202,000
July: 200,000 v. 162,000
August: 176,000 v. 152,000