US Unemployment Rate Rose to 4.3% in July
A person walks past a job advertisement in the U.S., 2024. Photo: X/ @laurbjn
August 2, 2024 Hour: 11:21 am
Nonfarm payroll employment edged up by 114,000 in July, below the average monthly gain of 215,000 over the prior 12 months.
On Friday, the U.S. Labor Department reported that employers added only 114,000 jobs in July, raising unemployment to 4.3 percent and signaling a continuous cooling-down of the labor market.
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Employment continued to trend up in health care, construction, transportation, and warehousing, while the information industry lost jobs. Nonfarm payroll employment edged up by 114,000 in July, below the average monthly gain of 215,000 over the prior 12 months.
The growth in total nonfarm payroll employment for May was revised down by 2,000 to 216,000, and the change for June was revised down by 27,000 to a gain of 179,000. With these revisions, employment in May and June combined is 29,000 lower than previously reported.
In February, the unemployment rate increased to 3.9 percent, the highest level in two years, before slightly dropping to 3.8 percent in March. In April, the unemployment rate again edged up to 3.9 percent before ticking up to 4.0 percent in May. For June, the unemployment rose to 4.1 percent.
The 4.3-percent unemployment rate marks the highest since October 2021. With the latest data for July, the unemployment rate has been trending up for four consecutive months, as the labor market shows signs of weakening.
Desmond Lachman, a former official from the International Monetary Fund, believes that the Federal Reserve (Fed) should have cut rates at their meeting earlier this week.
“Inflation has come down to close to the Fed’s 2-percent inflation target, the economy is slowing, and the labor market is no longer overheated. In addition, the global economy seems to be souring and the Fed’s high interest rates are exacerbating the slow motion train wreck underway in the real commercial property market,” he said.
“It is important to remember the Fed has two mandates. It can’t wait until it is 100 percent certain that inflation is back at target. It has to keep in mind its full employment mandate,” said Dean Baker, a senior economist at the Center for Economic and Policy Research, adding that there is a real risk that unemployment will rise further in the rest of this year.
In July, average hourly earnings for all employees on private nonfarm payrolls increased by 8 cents, or 0.2 percent, to US$35.07. Over the past 12 months, average hourly earnings have increased by 3.6 percent.
Autor: teleSUR/ JF
Fuente: Xinhua
