September 2018 Jobs Update

This Market Intel glances at the headline figures in the most recent jobs report. Next week we will take an exhaustive dive into the details.

The 134,000 jobs the economy added in September is down noticeably from last month’s revised figure of 270,000, and well below the 201,000-monthly average for the last 12 months. The unemployment rate ticked down to 3.7 percent, with average hourly earnings for all employees on private, non-farm jobs up 2.8 percent for the year.

A little toe-dip into the water shows that the Leisure and Hospitality group saw a reduction of 17,000 jobs during September, even though this category had been showing some signs of growth in the several previous months. Recall though that we did fight through Hurricane Florence during this reporting period, and this would likely be one of the most likely places for weather-related job losses to show up.

Flashing back to September 2017, we fought through not one, but two hurricanes, Irma and Harvey. The October 2017 jobs report gave an initial estimate of job losses for September 2017 at 33,000. Similarly, this October 2018 report is also only an initial estimate of job changes for September 2018. The final estimate for September 2017 pegged overall job increases at 14,000. So, while the initial estimate for September 2018 is well below the annual average, let’s wait a bit to pass final judgement. It’s worth noting, however, that the Leisure and Hospitality section was understandably hard hit in September 2017, posting 105,000 job losses.