Though the decline in the jobless rate from 3.7% in August was partly because of people leaving the workforce, fewer Americans worked part-time for economic reasons last month, the Labor Department's closely watched employment report showed on Friday. The labor market continues to show resilience despite the Fed's stiff interest rate hikes, which are slowing demand.
President Joe Biden said the job gains were "an encouraging sign that we are transitioning to stable, steady growth." Last month's broad increase in employment was led by the leisure and hospitality industry, where payrolls increased by 83,000 jobs. The bulk of the gains were at restaurants and bars. Still, leisure and hospitality employment remains 1.1 million jobs below its pre-pandemic level.
"The economy did not fall into recession the first half of 2022, nor did it fall into recession in the third quarter," said Brian Bethune, an economics professor at Boston College. "Yet, the inveterate recession predictors just keep moving their recession date into the future." The labor market's resilience has been attributed to a reluctance by businesses to lay off workers following difficulties hiring in the past year as the COVID-19 pandemic forced some people out of the workforce, partly due to prolonged illness caused by the virus.dropped by 1.1 million, the largest decline since April 2020, to 10.1 million on the last day of August, there are still 4 million more vacancies than there are unemployed Americans.
As a result, the labor force participation rate, or the proportion of working-age Americans who have a job or are looking for one, slipped to 62.3% from 62.4% in August. It is 1.1 percentage points below its February 2020 level.Other details of the household survey were strong. Household employment increased strongly and the number of people working part-time for economic reasons dropped 306,000 to 3.8 million.
How does every major news outlet suddenly, out of the blue, start using the term solid. All at the same time?
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