Friday, November 04, 2016

US Unemployment Rate Drops To 4.9%


The final US employment report before the presidential election was released on Friday.
US employers added 161,000 non-farm payrolls in October, which was a bit lighter than the 173,000 expected by economists.
This was driven by the addition of 142,000 private payrolls. Notably, manufacturing payrolls fell by 9,000 during the period.
The unemployment rate fell to 4.9% from 5.0% a month ago. This was largely attributable to the 195,000 Americans that dropped out of the labor force, which brought the labor force participation rate down to 62.8% from 62.9%.

 Below is a look at unemployment rates by demographic.

Unemployment rates for most demographics fell. The unemployment rate for black or African American workers climbed to 8.6% from 8.3%. The unemployment rate for high school graduates with no college ticked up to 5.5% from 5.2%.

Below is a look at jobs added by industry. The main areas of weakness continue to be manufacturing and mining and logging.

The monthly US employment report is among the most closely watch economic reports in the world. Friday’s report is one before American voters head to the polls on Tuesday to vote for their next president.
As the candidate representing dramatic change, Republican Donald Trump has been expected to pounce on a disappointing report, or even spin negatively an encouraging report.

Labor market trends overall remain strong

This week, the Department of Labor reported 265,000 unemployment insurance claims, marking the 87th consecutive week this figure has been below 300,000.  You have to go back to 1970 to find a better time.

Monthly manufacturing surveys also signaled strength. The employment indices of the ISM manufacturing report, Philly Fed report, Kansas City Fed report, and Richmond Fed report.

While any short-term blip in the data may be cause for concern, it would take several months of disappointing data to cause the trends to inflect in a worrisome way.
http://finance.yahoo.com/news/us-payrolls-report-october-2016-120057333.html

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