Total nonfarm employment in the Houston-The Woodlands-Sugar Land Metropolitan Statistical Area stood at 3,042,800 in April 2017, up 41,900, or 1.4 percent, from one year earlier, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported today. During the same period, the national job count also increased 1.4 percent. Assistant Commissioner for Regional Operations Stanley W. Suchman noted that the Houston area’s April increase was its eighth consecutive month of over-the-year job gains. (See chart 1 and table 1; the Technical Note at the end of this release contains metropolitan area definitions. All data in this release are not seasonally adjusted; accordingly, over-the-year analysis is used throughout.)

Industry employment

In the Houston metropolitan area, 4 of 11 industry supersectors added more than 10,000 jobs each from April 2016 to April 2017. Education and health services added the largest number of jobs among the local supersectors, up 12,700 during the period. The 3.4-percent annual gain compared to a national increase of 2.2 percent. Locally, ambulatory health care services (+4,000) and hospitals (+3,500) added the most jobs in this sector. (See table 1 and chart 2.) 

Government added 12,300 jobs over the year, the second-largest gain among Houston’s supersectors. The local area’s government educational services accounted for the bulk of the gain with an increase of 10,600 jobs. In the Houston area, government employment rose 3.0 percent over the year compared to a 0.6-percent national gain.

Employment in the local professional and business services supersector increased by 11,800 from April 2016 to April 2017; the local 2.5-percent annual job growth rate was the highest since April 2015. Houston’s job gains were concentrated in the employment services industry which rose 18.9 percent over the year, its highest annual rate of increase since March 2011. Nationally, professional and business services employment rose 2.9 percent in April 2017.

Houston’s leisure and hospitality supersector added 11,100 jobs over the year. The 3.6-percent local rate of job growth was twice the U.S. increase of 1.8 percent. The local job gains were concentrated in the sector’s largest industry, food services and drinking places, which added 8,700 jobs during the period.

Manufacturing employment in Houston rose by 5,100 from April 2016 to April 2017, marking the first month of annual job growth in local manufacturing since March 2015. Both the durable and non-durable manufacturing industries had employment increases over the year. The local area’s rate of manufacturing job growth, at 2.3 percent, compared to the national gain of 0.3 percent.

Three local supersectors lost more than 1,000 jobs each over the year. Construction had the largest job loss in the Houston area, declining by 7,600 from April 2016 to April 2017. Nearly two-thirds of the local sector’s job losses were in the heavy and civil engineering industry, where employment fell by 4,900 over the year. Locally, employment in the construction supersector declined at a 3.4-percent annual pace, compared to an increase of 2.4 percent nationwide.

Employment in Houston’s mining and logging supersector fell by 2,400 from April 2016, continuing the sector’s over-the-year declines that began in February 2015. Despite the latest job loss, the annual rate of decline has slowed in each of the previous six months. Locally, employment in mining and logging fell 2.7 percent over the year in April 2017, while nationally it rose 3.6 percent.

Houston’s largest employer – trade, transportation, and utilities – lost 1,900 jobs from April 2016 to April 2017. Within the supersector, the annual job losses in wholesale trade offset job gains in retail trade and in transportation and warehousing. Over the year, local employment in trade, transportation, and utilities fell 0.3 percent compared to a 0.7-percent increase nationwide.

Employment in the 12 largest metropolitan areas

Houston-The Woodlands-Sugar Land was 1 of the nation’s 12 largest metropolitan statistical areas in April 2017. All 12 areas had over-the-year job growth during the period, with the rates of job growth in 7 areas exceeding the national increase of 1.4 percent. Atlanta-Sandy Springs-Roswell had the fastest rate of job growth, 3.3 percent, followed by Dallas-Fort Worth-Arlington at 3.0 percent. Chicago-Naperville-Elgin had the slowest rate of job growth, up 0.3 percent. (See chart 3 and table 2.)

The Dallas area added the largest number of jobs over the year, 104,600, followed by Atlanta (+87,200) and New York-Newark-Jersey City (+83,100). Chicago had the smallest employment gain over the year, adding 13,800 jobs, followed by Washington-Arlington-Alexandria, which added 38,000 jobs.

Over the year, education and health services added the most jobs in seven areas: Chicago, Houston, Los Angeles-Long Beach-Anaheim, Miami-Fort Lauderdale-West Palm Beach, New York, Philadelphia-Camden-Wilmington, and San Francisco-Oakland-Hayward. Manufacturing lost the most jobs over the year in three areas: Boston-Cambridge-Nashua, New York, and Philadelphia. Atlanta and San Francisco had no annual job losses in any supersector.

Metropolitan area employment data for May 2017 are scheduled to be released on Friday, June 16, 2017, at 10:00 a.m. (ET).

Technical Note

This release presents nonfarm payroll employment estimates from the Current Employment Statistics (CES) program. The CES survey is a Federal-State cooperative endeavor between State employment security agencies and the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

Definitions. Employment data refer to persons on establishment payrolls who receive pay for any part of the pay period that includes the 12th of the month. Persons are counted at their place of work rather than at their place of residence; those appearing on more than one payroll are counted on each payroll. Industries are classified on the basis of their principal activity in accordance with the 2012 version of the North American Industry Classification System.

Method of estimation. The employment data are estimated using a "link relative" technique in which a ratio (link relative) of current-month employment to that of the previous month is computed from a sample of establishments reporting for both months. The estimates of employment for the current month are obtained by multiplying the estimates for the previous month by these ratios. Small-domain models are used as the official estimators for the approximately 39 percent of CES published series which have insufficient sample for direct sample-based estimates.

Annual revisions. Employment estimates are adjusted annually to a complete count of jobs, called benchmarks, derived principally from tax reports that are submitted by employers who are covered under state unemployment insurance (UI) laws. The benchmark information is used to adjust the monthly estimates between the new benchmark and the preceding one and also to establish the level of employment for the new benchmark month. Thus, the benchmarking process establishes the level of employment, and the sample is used to measure the month-to-month changes in the level for the subsequent months.

Reliability of the estimates. The estimates presented in this release are based on sample surveys, administrative data, and modeling and, thus, are subject to sampling and other types of errors. Sampling error is a measure of sampling variability—that is, variation that occurs by chance because a sample rather than the entire population is surveyed. Survey data also are subject to nonsampling errors, such as those which can be introduced into the data collection and processing operations. Estimates not directly derived from sample surveys are subject to additional errors resulting from the specific estimation processes used. The sums of individual items may not always equal the totals shown in the same tables because of rounding.

Employment estimates. Measures of sampling error are available for state CES data at the total nonfarm and supersector level and for metropolitan area CES data. Information on recent benchmark revisions for states is available on the BLS Web site at www.bls.gov/sae/.

Area definitions. The substate area data published in this release reflect the delineations issued by the U.S. Office of Management and Budget, dated July 15, 2015. A detailed list of the geographic definitions is available at www.bls.gov/lau/lausmsa.htm.

The Houston-The Woodlands-Sugarland Metropolitan Statistical Area includes Austin, Brazoria, Chambers, Fort Bend, Galveston, Harris, Liberty, Montgomery, and Waller Counties in Texas.

Additional information
More complete information on the technical procedures used to develop these estimates and additional data appear in Employment and Earnings, which is available online at www.bls.gov/opub/ee/home.htm. Industry employment data for states and metropolitan areas from the Current Employment Statistics program are also available in the above mentioned news releases and from the Internet at www.bls.gov/sae/.

Information in this release will be made available to sensory impaired individuals upon request. Voice phone: (202) 691-5200; Federal Relay Service: (800) 877-8339.