(The Center Square) – Newly released federal data show the economy created more jobs than expected but unemployment rose in October.
The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics released the data, which showed the economy added 261,000 jobs in October, higher than the Dow Jones estimate of 205,000 new jobs.
“Notable job gains occurred in health care, professional and technical services, and manufacturing,” BLS said.
The unemployment rate rose to 3.7%, up 0.2% and worse than expected. The number of Americans who want full-time work but are working part-time for economic reasons increased as well. The number of unemployed people is actually much higher, though, but is not included in BLS unemployment rate.
“The number of persons not in the labor force who currently want a job was little changed at 5.7 million in October and remains above its February 2020 level of 5.0 million,” BLS said. “These individuals were not counted as unemployed because they were not actively looking for work during the 4 weeks preceding the survey or were unavailable to take a job.”
Unemployment varies by demographic.
“Among the major worker groups, the unemployment rates for adult women (3.4 percent) and Whites (3.2 percent) rose in October,” BLS said. “The jobless rates for adult men (3.3 percent), teenagers (11.0 percent), Blacks (5.9 percent), Asians (2.9 percent), and Hispanics (4.2 percent) showed little or no change over the month.”
Job gains also varied by sector.
“In October, employment in health care rose by 53,000, with gains in ambulatory health care services (+31,000), nursing and residential care facilities (+11,000), and hospitals (+11,000),” BLS said. “So far in 2022, health care employment has increased by an average of 47,000 per month, compared with 9,000 per month in 2021.Professional and technical services added 43,000 jobs in October. Employment continued to trend up in management and technical consulting services (+7,000), architectural and engineering services (+7,000), and scientific research and development services (+5,000). Monthly job growth in professional and technical services has averaged 41,000 thus far in 2022, compared with 53,000 per month in 2021.”