Hiring in the United States was considerably higher in April than it was March, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics’ monthly jobs report announced Friday. In April, the BLS reported, the seasonally adjusted net gain in new jobs was 211,000, with 194,000 of those hires in the private sector, 17,000 in the public sector. A consensus of experts surveyed by Bloomberg in advance of the report had forecast the gains would be around 185,000.
The bureau also revised job gains it had previously announced over the past two months. The March numbers were revised from 98,000 to 79,000, the February numbers from 219,000 to 232,000. Such revisions are standard procedure as more complete information is obtained in the months after a jobs report is released. Additional, usually minor, adjustments occur at yearly intervals.
The BLS count always includes both full-time and part-time positions. A person who has worked even one hour a week during the survey period is counted as employed.
April marked the 79th consecutive month of overall job growth, a record. The headline unemployment rate—the BLS labels this U3—fell slightly to 4.4 percent, the lowest level since May 2007. Since 2010, there has been an 11.4 million net gain in jobs after a Great Recession net loss of 8.8 million from February 2008 through December 2009.
Elise Gould at the Economic Policy Institute wrote earlier this week:
As with workers across the economy, young graduates’ economic prospects have brightened as the economy has gradually improved, and this year’s graduates may see better opportunities than their older brothers and sisters did when they graduated. Unemployment rates for young high school and college graduates have returned to within one percentage point of their pre-recession levels. But that’s pretty much where the good news ends. Underemployment continues to be elevated as young workers don’t get the hours they want or continue to be discouraged and a significant share of young workers continue to be “idled” by the economy (neither working nor in school). Large swaths of young college graduates are working at jobs that don’t require a college degree, and average wages of high school graduates are still below where they were in 2000.
For the benefits of a growing economy to reach all corners of the labor market, white as well as black, prime-age as well as young, and college-educated as well as high school–educated, the labor market has to be allowed to tighten up enough to push up wages and opportunities for all.
Another BLS gauge of the unemployment situation in addition to U3, is U6, the most inclusive measure of “labor underutilitization.” This gauges both unemployment and underemployment. Many economists believe it provides a better look of job health than U3. But there’s disagreement about this. A key U6 component consists of workers in part-time jobs who would like to have—but cannot find—full-time positions. U6 fell 0.3 points to 8.6 percent in April after a 0.3 percent fall in March.
Average hourly earnings rose 65 cents over last April, a 2.5 percent year-over-year gain. The current annual inflation rate is 2.4 percent. That means workers, on average, are treading water economically. Long-term trends show that the middle class is taking big financial hits. Even CNN has taken note of what political activists first pointed out—that most of the financial gains during the recovery from the Great Recession have gone to people occupying the upper tiers of the U.S. economy. Pr*sident Donald Trump and other Republicans are eager to make that inequality worse.
Unemployment rates differ by race and sex. For U3: Adult men: 4.0 percent; Adult women: 4.1 percent; Whites: 3.8 percent; Blacks: 7.9 percent; Asians: 3.2 percent; Hispanics: 5.2 percent; American Indians: (not counted monthly); Teenagers: 14.7 percent; (for teenagers of color, the unemployment rate is usually much higher.)
The BLS calculates the net gain (or loss) in jobs each month via the Current Employment Survey of 147,000 business establishments and government agencies. The unemployment rate, however, is based on a different survey—the Current Population Survey of 60,000 households. You can read details here of how the BLS makes its calculations and why it seasonally adjusts the numbers.
For its monthly estimates, the bureau has established a "confidence level" of plus or minus 115,000 jobs. That means the "real" number of new jobs created in April was not 211,000 but rather ranged between a gain of 96,000 and gain of 326,000.
The civilian workforce rose in April by 12,000 after having risen by 145,000 in March. The labor force participation rate slipped to 62.9 percent, and the employment-population ratio rose 0.1 points to 60.2 percent, the highest level since February 2009.
One special calculation the bureau makes as part of each month’s jobs report measures the employment-population ratio for people age 25 to 54. Individuals in this age group are the most likely of any workers to be employed, and their situation is viewed as key indicator of America’s overall economic health, hence the attention the bureau gives it. Eighteen years ago, this age group reached its highest employment-population ratio—84.6 percent. It hit its lowest point—74.8 percent—in November 2010. Since then, it’s been slowly rising. In April it climbed to 78.6 percent, the highest level it’s been since September 2008.
Here are some other details from the report:
• Average hourly earnings of private-sector production and nonsupervisory employees rose 6 cents an hour to $21.96 in April.
• Average work week for all employees on non-farm payrolls rose in April to 34.4 hours.
• Average hourly earnings for all employees on private non-farm payrolls {{{rose 7 cents an hour in April to $26.19.
• The manufacturing workweek in April rose 0.1 hours at 40.7 hours.
• The average workweek for production and nonsupervisory employees on private non-farm payrolls in April rose 0.1 hours to 33.7 hours.
April Job Gains and Losses for selected categories:
- Professional services: 39,000
- Temporary help services: 5,800
- Transportation & warehousing: 3,500
- Financial activities: 19,000
- Leisure & hospitality: 55,000
- Information: -7,000
- Education and health services: 41,000
- Health care & social assistance: 36,800
- Retail trade: 6,300
- Construction: 5,000
- Manufacturing: 6,000
- Mining and Logging: 10,000
Here's what the seasonally adjusted job growth numbers have looked like in the previous 10 years compared with this April’s gain of 211,000.
April 2007: 80,000
April 2008: -210,000
April 2009: -687,000
April 2010: 243,000
April 2011: 346,000
April 2012: 78,000
April 2013: 197,000
April 2014: 329,000
April 2015: 262,000
April 2016: 153,000