Insights and Perspectives

While the labor force and unemployment rate remained unchanged, the U.S. economy gained 353,000 jobs in January, far exceeding the expectations of 255,000 jobs from the GSI Labor Market Forecast and 185,000 jobs from the WSJ Survey earlier this week.

According to the monthly Current Employment Statistics (CES) report and Current Population Survey (CPS) from The Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), employment in the U.S. in December 2023 gained 216,000 additional jobs, while the unemployment rate stayed at 3.7%.

According to the monthly Current Employment Statistics (CES) report and Current Population Survey (CPS) from The Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), employment in the U.S. in November 2023 picked up to 199,000 additional jobs, while the unemployment rate declined to 3.7%.

In October 2023, the Bureau of Labor Statistics stated that employment in the U.S. slowed to 150,000 additional jobs, while the unemployment rate ticked up to 3.9%.

Employment was quite a bit stronger over the last three months than originally estimated. Revisions in July and August added 119,000 more jobs than reported last month.

Employment noticeably softened during the summer, averaging only 150,000 new jobs per month from June through August after averaging 238,000 from March to May of this year.

Despite fluctuations among indicators pointing to a slower pace of job creation, initial estimates over the last three months have been remarkably locked in place with September reporting 263,000 initial new jobs, October reporting 261,000 initial new jobs, and November reporting 263,000 initial new jobs.