Nonfarm payroll employment continued to decline in September (-263,000), and the unemployment rate (9.8%) continued to trend up, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported. The largest job losses were in construction, manufacturing, retail trade, and government.
Since the start of the recession in December 2007, the number of unemployed persons has increased by 7.6 million to 15.1 million, and the unemployment rate has doubled to 9.8%.
From May through September, job losses averaged 307,000 per month, compared with losses averaging 645,000 per month from November 2008 to April. Since the start of the recession in December 2007, payroll employment has fallen by 7.2 million.
Wholesale trade employment was down by 4.9% from August to September. Durable goods wholesale trade employment fell by 6.4% and nondurable fell by 1.2%.
In September, construction employment declined by 64,000. Monthly job losses averaged 66,000 from May through September, compared with an average of 117,000 per month from November to April. September job cuts were concentrated in the industry’s nonresidential components (-39,000) and in heavy construction (-12,000). Since December 2007, employment in construction has fallen by 1.5 million.
Employment in manufacturing fell by 51,000 in September. Over the past three months, job losses have averaged 53,000 per month, compared with an average monthly loss of 161,000 from October to June. Employment in manufacturing has contracted by 2.1 million since the onset of the recession.
On the other hand, employment in health care continued to increase in September (19,000), with
the largest gain occurring in ambulatory health care services (15,000). Health care has added 559,000 jobs since the beginning of the recession, although the average monthly job gain thus far in 2009 (22,000) is down from the average monthly gain during 2008 (30,000).
Employment in transportation and warehousing continued to trend down in September.
In September, the average workweek for production and nonsupervisory workers on private nonfarm payrolls edged down by 0.1 hour to 33.0 hours. Both the manufacturing workweek and factory overtime decreased by 0.1 hour over the month, to 39.8 and 2.8 hours, respectively.
In September, average hourly earnings of production and nonsupervisory workers on private nonfarm payrolls edged up by 1 cent, or 0.1 percent, to $18.67. Over the past 12 months, average hourly earnings have risen by 2.5 percent, while average weekly earnings have risen by only 0.7 percent due to declines in the average workweek.
