October Jobs Report

On Friday November 3rd, the U.S. Labor Department released their October Employment Report. This month falls short of expectations in job creation, specifically in manufacturing with a decline in 35k jobs, likely due to strike activity.

With unemployment changing only slightly with an increase to 3.9% and over 3 million more jobs than job seekers, recruitment and retention remain top of mind for business owners.

Key Insights:

The October Employment report revealed job creation of only 150,000 new jobs, missing expectations of at least 180,000 created. This is a significant decline from September's additions. While all industries saw a decline in job creation as compared to September, the industry seeing the largest decline is manufacturing with a dip of 35,000 jobs. The Bureau of Labor Statistics credits this to the United Auto Workers strike which continued through October.

Much like previous months, the Education and Health Services sector continues to see the most growth with 89,000 jobs added in October.

The unemployment rate and workforce participation rate changed ever so slightly with unemployment increasing to 3.9% and participation decreasing to 62.7%.

The employment report for October was lower than expected and there seems to be a slowing in hiring and in converting candidates to employees. This as a reminder that retaining and recruiting top talent in this market remains a challenge. With a 3.1M gap between open jobs and available workers, if you need talent to serve your clients or grow your business the time to start searching is NOW!

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