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Payroll employment in 2007: job growth slows
Robyn J. Richards
Nonfarm payroll employment, as measured by the Current Employment Statistics (CES) survey, increased by slightly more than 1 million in 2007, to a level of 138.1 million.1 Job growth slowed from 1.6 percent in 2006 to 0.8 percent in 2007, the lowest annual growth rate since 2003. (See chart 1.)
Employment trends varied by industry. (See table 1.) Deceleration in the housing market and problems with subprime mortgages had a negative effect on employment in construction and other housing-related industries. Manufacturing continued its long-term contraction, while health care, professional and technical services, food services and drinking places, and local government continued to expand. Employment services, which had hit a high point in August 2006, lost jobs throughout most of 2007. Increased prices for crude oil and related commodities spurred growth in oil and gas extraction. However, high fuel prices and weakened consumer confidence were reflected in constrained job growth in retail trade and in transportation and warehousing.
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Footnotes
1
The Current Employment Statistics (CES) program is a monthly survey of about 150,000 business and government agencies, representing approximately 390,000 individual worksites. For more information on the program’s concepts and methodology, see “Technical Notes to Establishment Data Published in Employment and Earnings,” on the Internet at www.bls.gov/web/empsit.supp.toc.htm#technote (visited Mar. 12, 2008). CES data are available on the Internet at www.bls.gov/ces/ (visited Mar. 12, 2008). The CES data used in this article are seasonally adjusted unless otherwise noted.
Current Employment Statistics
Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey (JOLTS)
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