US labor market adds 142,000 jobs, well above July’s figure but less than expected

September 6 () –

The U.S. economy generated 142,000 new nonfarm jobs in August, up from 89,000 in July, while the unemployment rate fell by one-tenth of a point to 4.2 percent, the Labor Department said Friday.

The US labour market is thus recovering from the poor July figures just before the Federal Reserve (Fed) meeting scheduled for Tuesday and Wednesday of next week, although fewer jobs were created than expected.

In any case, there have been 44 consecutive months of job creation, although the figure for August is below the average for the last twelve months, which is 202,000 new jobs.

Hiring increased mainly in construction, healthcare and social services, while industry reduced staff.

There was little change in the mining, oil and gas extraction, wholesale and retail trade, transport and storage, information sector, financial activities, business and professional services, leisure and tourism, other services and government sectors.

In addition, the Ministry of Labour has revised the June figure downwards by 61,000 jobs, from 179,000 to 118,000, and the July figure by another 25,000, from 114,000 to 89,000. With these changes, 86,000 jobs have been reduced compared to the previous figures.

The unemployment rate stood at 4.2% in August, one-tenth less than the previous month and four-tenths more than in the same month in 2023.

The number of unemployed in the eighth month of the year reached 7.115 million compared to 7.163 million in July, including 1.533 million long-term unemployed (those without work for 27 weeks or more) who represented 21.5% of the total number of unemployed.

The number of people working part-time for economic reasons increased by 264,000 to 4.83 billion. The labour force participation rate remained unchanged at 62.7%.

SUBSIDY APPLICATIONS

The number of applications for unemployment benefits in the United States reached 227,000 last week, 5,000 fewer than the previous figure, the same ministry revealed on Thursday.

The number of recipients of this benefit totalled 1.838 million in the week ending 24 August, which is a reduction of 22,000 people in the number of beneficiaries, compared to 1.860 million in the previous week. In the same comparable period in 2023, the number of citizens receiving benefits reached 1.802 million.