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Friday, November 07, 2014

October Employment Report: 214,000 Jobs, 5.8% Unemployment Rate

by Calculated Risk on 11/07/2014 08:30:00 AM

From the BLS:

Total nonfarm payroll employment rose by 214,000 in October, and the unemployment rate edged down to 5.8 percent, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported today.
...
The change in total nonfarm payroll employment for August was revised from +180,000 to +203,000, and the change for September was revised from +248,000 to +256,000. With these revisions, employment gains in August and September combined were 31,000 more than previously reported.
Payroll jobs added per monthClick on graph for larger image.

The first graph shows the monthly change in payroll jobs, ex-Census (meaning the impact of the decennial Census temporary hires and layoffs is removed to show the underlying payroll changes).

Employment is now up 2.64 million year-over-year.

Total employment is now 1.3 million above the pre-recession peak.

unemployment rateThe second graph shows the employment population ratio and the participation rate.

The Labor Force Participation Rate increased in October to 62.8% from 62.7% in September. This is the percentage of the working age population in the labor force.   A large portion of the recent decline in the participation rate is due to demographics.

The Employment-Population ratio increased to 59.2% (black line).

I'll post the 25 to 54 age group employment-population ratio graph later.

Employment Pop Ratio, participation and unemployment ratesThe third graph shows the unemployment rate.

The unemployment rate decreased in October to 5.8%.

This was below expectations, but with the upward revisions to prior months, this was solid report.

I'll have much more later ...