Nonfarm payroll employment increased by 146,000 in January and the unemployment rate decreased to 5.2 percent, the Bureau of Labor Statistics of the U.S. Department of Labor reported today. Job growth continued in several service-providing industries, while manufacturing employment declined over the month.
Unemployment (Household Survey Data)
Both the number of unemployed persons, 7.7 million, and the unemployment rate, 5.2 percent, declined in January. The jobless rate was down from 5.7 percent a year earlier. Over the month, the unemployment rates for adult men (4.7 percent), whites (4.4 percent), and Hispanics or Latinos (6.1 percent) edged down, while the rates for adult women (4.6 percent), teenagers (16.3 percent), and blacks or African Americans (10.6 percent) showed little change. The unemployment rate for Asians was 4.2 percent, not seasonally adjusted.The number of long-term unemployed--those unemployed 27 weeks and over-was about unchanged over the month. This group accounted for 20.9 percent of the unemployed.
Total Employment and the Labor Force (Household Survey Data)
Total employment, as measured by the household survey, was little changed at 140.2 million, seasonally adjusted, in January. The employment-population ratio--the proportion of the population age 16 and older with jobs-remained at 62.4 percent. The civilian labor force was 148.0 million, after seasonal adjustment. The labor force participation rate edged down over the month to 65.8 percent.The number of persons who work part time for economic reasons was 4.4 million in January, seasonally adjusted. The January level was about unchanged from December, but was down by 308,000 over the year. This category is comprised primarily of persons who indicated that they would like to work full time but were working part time because their hours had been cut back or because they were unable to find full-time jobs.
At 7.2 million, not seasonally adjusted, the number of persons who held more than one job was about unchanged in January from a year earlier. These multiple jobholders represented 5.2 percent of total employment, the same proportion as in January 2004.
Persons Not in the Labor Force (Household Survey Data)
There were 1.8 million persons who were marginally attached to the labor force in January, about unchanged from a year earlier. (Data are not seasonally adjusted.) These individuals wanted and were available to work and had looked for a job sometime in the prior 12 months. They were not counted as unemployed, however, because they did not actively search for work in the 4 weeks preceding the survey. The number of discouraged workers, at 515,000 in January, was slightly higher than a year earlier. Discouraged workers, a subset of the marginally attached, were not currently looking for work specifically because they believed no jobs were available for them. The other 1.3 million marginally attached had not searched for work for reasons such as school or family responsibilities.
