Advance copies of this statement are made available to the
press under lock-up conditions with the explicit
understanding that the data are embargoed until 8:30 a.m.
Eastern Daylight Time.

                        Statement of
                              
                     Kathleen P. Utgoff
                        Commissioner
                 Bureau of Labor Statistics
                              
                   Friday, August 5, 2005


     Nonfarm payroll employment rose by 207,000 in July, and
the unemployment rate held at 5.0 percent.  Over the year,
payroll employment has increased by 2.2 million, of which
2.0 million was in the private sector.  In July, job gains
occurred in many service-providing industries.

     Retail trade employment grew by 50,000 in July, with
gains widespread among the component industries.  Employment
in retail trade has increased by 352,000 since its recent
low in June 2003.  In July, employment rose in clothing and
clothing accessories stores and in building material and
garden supply stores.  Automobile dealers also added jobs,
as special incentives to buyers raised sales volume.

     Employment in food services and drinking places
increased by 30,000 over the month and has expanded by
262,000 since July 2004.  This industry accounted for the
vast majority of the job growth in leisure and hospitality,
both over the month and over the year.

     Health care employment rose by 29,000 in July and has
increased by 256,000 over the year.  Over the month, job
growth continued in hospitals, nursing and residential care
facilities, and ambulatory health care services (which
includes doctors’ offices and outpatient clinics).

     Elsewhere in the service-providing sector, employment
increased by 23,000 in professional and technical services.
Job gains continued over the month in architectural and
engineering services and in management and technical
consulting services.  Financial activities employment also
continued to grow (21,000).  Within finance, employment in
credit intermediation remained on an upward trend, increas-
ing by 93,000 over the year.  Real estate employment rose
by 10,000 over the month and by 54,000 over the year.  In
July, temporary help services employment was flat and has
shown little net change since April.

     In the goods-producing sector, construction employment
continued to trend up.  Thus far this year, job gains in
construction have averaged 21,000 per month, about in line
with the average monthly increase during 2004.  Employment
in manufacturing was flat in July.  A decline in motor
vehicles and parts manufacturing (-11,000) reflected larger-
than-normal shutdowns for annual retooling.  The factory
workweek was unchanged at 40.4 hours in July; factory
overtime rose by 0.1 hour to 4.5 hours per week.

     Average hourly earnings of private production or
nonsupervisory workers rose by 6 cents over the month to
$16.13, following a 4-cent increase in June.  Over the year,
average hourly earnings grew by 2.7 percent.

     Looking at some of our measures obtained from the
survey of households, the unemployment rate remained at 5.0
percent in July, down from 5.5 percent a year earlier.  The
unemployment rate for blacks declined from 10.3 to 9.5
percent over the month.  Jobless rates for most other major
worker groups showed little or no change in July but several
have declined over the year.  For instance, the rate for
Hispanics fell by 1.3 percentage points over the past 12
months.  The number of unemployed persons, at 7.5 million,
was little changed over the month but was down by 687,000
over the year.

     In July, both the number of employed persons and the
civilian labor force rose.  The employment-population ratio
--the proportion of the civilian population age 16 and over
that is employed--is up by half a percentage point since
February.



     To summarize the data for July released today, employ-
ment increased over the month, with widespread gains in the
service-providing sector.  The unemployment rate held at
5.0 percent.