Employment Up – Unemployment Unchanged

• Unadjusted Employment rose from 154.416 million to 154.990
• Labor Force Participation is Down from 62.2% to 62.1%
• Adjusted U-3 was unchanged at 3.7%
• Unadjusted U-3 was unchanged at 3.4%
• Unadjusted U-6 was Up from 6.3% to 6.4%

The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) released its employment / unemployment report for November on December 2^nd.

According to the Commissioner of the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics:

“Nonfarm payroll employment rose by 263,000 in November, and the unemployment rate was unchanged at 3.7 percent. Notable job gains occurred in leisure and hospitality, health care, and government. Employment declined in retail trade and in
transportation and warehousing. The November gain in nonfarm payroll employment was roughly in line with average growth over the prior 3 months (+282,000). Monthly job growth thus far in 2022 has averaged 392,000, compared with 562,000 per month in 2021.”

You can read the full BLS report here.

As usual, they are talking about “Seasonally Adjusted Jobs” from the “Household Survey” rather than looking at the results reported by actual companies in the BLS “Establishment Survey”.

Looking at the Establishment Survey report, we see…
Originally the BLS reported employment of 154.369 million for October, which they adjusted up to 154.416 million. So, 47,000 additional jobs appeared for October.

November gained an additional 574,000 jobs bringing the total up to 154.990 million.

ADP^® National Employment Report

According to ADP, in collaboration with Stanford Digital Economy Lab

Private employers added 127,000 jobs in November

• Job creation slowed by the most since January 2021, led by construction and other interest rate-sensitive sectors. Consumer-facing segments – including health care and hospitality – were bright spots.

ADP also lists increases by “firm size”.

Last month (October) ADP posted these changes…

For November, the numbers definitely look worse, with virtually all the gains in mid-sized companies. People are becoming more risk-averse, so fewer small companies are being started. At some point, when jobs are scarce, starting your own business becomes the only option, so small company creation increases again. :

November 2022 Employment by Sector

The employment “bubble chart” is a quick and easy way to see how each sector performs on a seasonally adjusted basis. The Bubble’s Size tells us the total Employment for that industry (i.e., larger bubbles mean more people are employed in that sector).

The bubble’s location on the chart tells us that there has been a change in Employment Levels over the most recent month… A bubble further to the right indicates larger job growth. A bubble’s vertical location on the chart shows the average industry salary.

In November, Leisure and Hospitality, Education, Construction, Manufacturing, and “Other” were the big gainers, while Retail was the big loser.

Average Weekly Wages Rose

$1,129.01 in November, $1,124.01 in October , $1,119.87 in September, $1116.42 in August, $1,116.54 in July, $1,106.76, in June, $1,105.47 in May and $1,102.01 in April, and $1,086.46 in December 2021. Surprisingly, Retail was the big loser, which is unusual for this time of year. 

Click for a larger image.

Remember, these are Seasonally Adjusted Numbers, so they aren’t cumulative!

Note: As usual, ADP has an entirely different picture with manufacturing, Financial, and Information losing  jobs instead of gaining them

ADP Job Losers

ADP does break up the categories slightly differently regarding their category Trade, Transportation, and Utilities. And their biggest gainer, Leisure and Hospitality, gained much more than the BLS says, as does Trade, Transportation, and Utilities.

ADP Job Gainers

BLS Employment and Average Weekly Earnings by Industry

November 2022, Seasonally Adjusted Employment

We’ve added another column to the table below that shows the employment levels that the BLS reported the previous month. Note that although they may claim that there was a “monthly increase”, there isn’t always a real increase; you can’t just subtract last month’s “employment level” from this month’s level. This is due to “seasonal adjusting”.

Source: BLS

Unemployment

Looking at the chart for unemployment, we see that despite the increase in the number of people employed, the unemployment rate was unchanged.

See Unemployment Rate Chart for more information.

Employment –Establishment Survey

Looking at the chart for employment, we see that current employment (154.990 million) is now above the 2019 peak (153.095 million) although the civilian population is over 5 million higher now.

See Current Employment for more info.

Unemployment Still Historically Low

Unemployment levels are still in the historically low territory. After all, the FED did pump unprecedented TRILLIONS into the economy to get us to this place.

See: FED Actions for more info.

But we can see that Seasonally Adjusted U-3 is definitely in the “Green” territory.

Click for a larger Image

November 2022 Labor Force Participation Rate

See Labor Force Participation Rate for more information.

Seasonally Adjusted U1 through U6 Unemployment Rates

For more information about the various measurements of unemployment, see  What Is U-6 Unemployment?