Summertime not a happy time for U.S. payroll employment; July’s BLS report another downer
Remember way back in February, when I mentioned how I love when the employment situation report is released on the first of the month? And how the rotten numbers from January had overshadowed that efficiency and ruined my fun. Well, here we are six months later, and it looks like my fun’s been spoiled again. It’s August 1, and the BLS is reporting that our streak of lost jobs has continued into July; the U.S can add another -51,000 positions to the tally for 2008. Following some (gasp!) positive revisions of past months’ totals, this decline brings the year’s payroll losses to a grand total 463,000 jobs. But hey, we still have five more months to go, so that could be cause for hope…or anxiety—really, it’s your pick.
The country’s overall unemployment rate jumped a bit over the course of July, rising from 5.5 percent at the end of June to 5.7 percent—the highest it’s been in several years. The unemployment rates for adult men, teenagers (+2.2 percent), whites, and African Americans all increased last month, with teenagers experiencing the biggest increase of the bunch. Over the past 12 months, the number of people working part time for economic reasons has grown by 1.4 million.
The losses and gains in our nation’s employment industries in July were, for the most part, standard. The manufacturing sector underwent minor cuts across the board in areas such as transportation equipment, wood products, and textile mills for a combined loss of 35,000 positions. The construction industry dropped 22,000 positions, and professional and business services cut 34,000. Temporary help services, a sub-category within professional and business services, has lost 185,000 jobs since January. Wholesale trade employment also declined by 17,000 in July, while the information industry dropped 13,000 positions. Finally, retail trade cut a total of 35,000 jobs over the month, which contributes to a net loss of 211,000 jobs for the sector since its peak in March of 2007.
Yet again, the health care sector was one of the only bright spots that July had to cling to. Employment in that industry grew by 33,000 positions, with the biggest gains occurring in ambulatory health care services (+21,000) and hospitals. Food services and drinking places—an industry that is typically able to hold its own next to health care—has officially slumped in its job growth, generating only 3,000 jobs within the past month. I’ll admit that I had been ignoring the mining sector’s job creation up to now, specifically the fact that it had been adding a few thousand jobs here and there over the past few months. I figured the BLS was just desperate for something positive to report on. But mining employment grew by 10,000 in July, making them at least a lukewarm spot in my book, and legitimate enough to include in this write up. (Or maybe I’m just the desperate one now.)
On that note, it’s about time to wrap this sob fest up. The average workweek for U.S. employees dropped off by 0.1 hours, while our average hourly earnings jumped up another six cents in July to $18.06. So we’re working less hours for more money. How’s that for a happy ending?
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