Toggle dark mode ShareFacebookXWhatsappTelegramMore…Copy link The increase more than doubled economists’ forecasts and marked the strongest monthly payroll gain since March, easing some concerns that hiring was rapidly deteriorating.
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Labor Day weekend starts with a BOOM: August jobs numbers BLEW past expectations. 💥
The report also brought significant upward revisions to the previous two months, turning July’s initially reported job loss into a gain and improving June’s total. Still, economists cautioned that one strong month does not necessarily mean the labor market has returned to consistently robust growth.
The Bureau of Labor Statistics reported Friday that nonfarm payroll employment increased by 162,000 in August, compared with forecasts that had generally called for a considerably smaller increase.
The unemployment rate held steady at 4.1 percent, rather than rising as some economists had anticipated.
“This jobs report did blow expectations out of the water,” Glassdoor chief economist Daniel Zhao told CNN, while cautioning that recent reports have produced substantial month-to-month swings.
The revisions also improved the picture from earlier in the summer, with July payrolls revised from a loss of 23,000 jobs to a gain of 21,000 and June revised from a gain of 20,000 to 31,000.
Together, those revisions added 55,000 jobs to previously reported totals for June and July.
The strongest August gains came from food services and drinking places, which added approximately 59,000 jobs, while local government education added about 42,000.
The broader leisure and hospitality sector gained roughly 62,000 positions after posting job losses during the previous two months.
Labor Day weekend starts with a BOOM: August jobs numbers BLEW past expectations. 💥
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Construction also added jobs, while manufacturing posted another month of gains, contributing to a broader distribution of employment growth than had been seen earlier in the year.
The information sector moved in the opposite direction, losing jobs during August, while financial activities also showed weakness.
The labor force participation rate rose to 61.6 percent, its first increase in several months, as more Americans entered or returned to the labor market.
There were also signs of continued strain beneath the headline numbers, including an increase in long-term unemployment and relatively weak hiring momentum compared with historical standards.
Average hourly earnings increased 0.3 percent during August and were 3.1 percent higher than a year earlier, continuing a slowdown in annual wage growth.
