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                            Statement of

                          Erica L. Groshen
                            Commissioner
                     Bureau of Labor Statistics

                        Friday, June 5, 2015


      Nonfarm payroll employment rose by 280,000 in May, and the 
unemployment rate was essentially unchanged at 5.5 percent. 
Employment rose in professional and business services, leisure 
and hospitality, and health care. Job losses continued in 
mining.

      Incorporating the revisions for March and April, which 
increased nonfarm employment by 32,000, on net, monthly job 
gains have averaged 207,000 over the past 3 months. In the 12 
months prior to May, employment growth averaged 251,000 per 
month.

      Employment in professional and business services rose by 
63,000 in May and by 671,000 over the year. Within the industry, 
computer systems design and related services added 10,000 jobs 
in May. Employment continued to trend up in temporary help 
services (+20,000), in management and technical consulting 
services (+7,000), and in architectural and engineering services 
(+5,000). 

      Employment in leisure and hospitality increased by 57,000 
over the month, after changing little in the prior 2 months. 
Employment in arts, entertainment, and recreation edged up in 
May (+29,000). Employment in food services and drinking places 
has shown little net change over the past 3 months.   

      Employment in health care increased by 47,000 in May and 
has grown by 408,000 over the year. Ambulatory health care 
services (+28,000) and hospitals (+16,000) added jobs over the 
month. 

      Retail trade employment edged up in May (+31,000). Over the 
prior 12 months, the industry had added an average of 24,000 
jobs per month. In May, automobile dealers added 8,000 jobs. 

      Employment continued to trend up in May in construction 
(+17,000), transportation and warehousing (+13,000), and 
financial activities (+13,000).    

      Manufacturing employment changed little for the fourth 
month in a row. The industry had added an average of 18,000 jobs 
per month from January 2014 to January 2015.

      Mining lost 17,000 jobs in May. The decrease was in support 
activities for mining, which include those for oil and gas 
operations. Employment in mining has fallen by 68,000 thus far 
in 2015, more than offsetting the 41,000 jobs gained during 
2014.

      Average hourly earnings of all employees on private nonfarm 
payrolls rose by 8 cents in May to $24.96. Over the past 12 
months, average hourly earnings have risen by 2.3 percent. From
April 2014 to April 2015, the Consumer Price Index for All Urban
Consumers (CPI-U) declined by 0.1 percentage point (on a 
seasonally adjusted basis).

      Turning now to data from our survey of households, both the 
unemployment rate, at 5.5 percent, and the number of unemployed 
persons, at 8.7 million, were essentially unchanged in May and 
have shown little movement since February. Among those 
unemployed in May, 28.6 percent had been jobless for 27 weeks or 
longer. Both the number of long-term unemployed and their share 
of total unemployment have fallen over the past 12 months.

      The civilian labor force rose by 397,000 in May. The labor 
force participation rate, at 62.9 percent, changed little over 
the month and has remained within a narrow range of 62.7 percent 
to 62.9 percent since April 2014. The employment-population 
ratio was essentially unchanged, at 59.4 percent, in May.

      The number of persons employed part time for economic 
reasons was about unchanged at 6.7 million in May and has shown 
little movement in recent months. These individuals, who would 
have preferred full-time employment, were working part time 
because their hours had been cut back or because they were 
unable to find full-time work. 

      Among people who were neither working nor looking for work 
in May, 1.9 million were classified as marginally attached to 
the labor force, down by 268,000 over the year. These 
individuals had not looked for work in the 4 weeks prior to the 
survey but wanted a job, were available for work, and had looked 
for a job within the last 12 months. The number of discouraged 
workers, a subset of the marginally attached who believed that 
no jobs were available for them, was 563,000 in May, down by 
134,000 over the year.

      In summary, nonfarm payroll employment rose by 280,000 in 
May, and the unemployment rate was essentially unchanged at 5.5 
percent.