Nonfarm payroll employment increased by 208,000 [revised 6/4/2010 from revised figure of +230,000 on 5/7/2010 and from original report of +162,000) in March, and the unemployment rate held at 9.7 percent, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics has reported. Temporary help services and health care continued to add jobs over the month. Employment in federal government also rose, reflecting the hiring of approximately 48,000 temporary workers for Census 2010. Employment continued to decline in financial activities and in information.
Barry Ritholtz at The Big Picture blog breaks down the report into negatives and positives, finding a mixed picture, but still, this was largest monthly gain in three years.
Negatives
• Average Hourly Earnings of all employees NFP fell by 2 cents, or 0.1%.
• Unemployment rate is unchanged at 9.7% (no improvement this month)
• Long-term unemployed (jobless for 27 weeks+) increased by 414,000 to 6.5 million. (bad)
• 44.1 percent of unemployed persons were jobless for 27 weeks +. (Also very bad)
• Involuntary part-time workers increased to 9.1 million in March. (This remains a stubborn problem area)Positives
• Average workweek was up by 0.1 hour to 34.0 hours in March.
• Temp help services added 40,000 jobs in March. That’s a cumulative add of 313k since September 2009.
• Census added “only” 48,000 workers — far below the 100-150k consensus. This pushes their hiring out into the rest of the year.
• Civilian Labor Force Participation Rate at 64.9% edged up in March
• Manufacturing continued to trend up (+17,000); Mfr added 45,000 jobs in Q1.
• Revisions: January 2010 data was revised upwards 40k (from-26k to +14k); February was revised up 22k (from -36k to -14k).
For more information on the employment report, please click on the “Employment Statistics” page on the menu bar at the top.
Gregg D. Killoren
victoria1014
