May 2017 employment: US adds 138,000 jobs

The Employment Situation‘ report released by the U.S. Department of Labor’s Bureau of Labor Statistics, the unemployment rate in the United States remained stable at 4.3%, while the economy added 138,000 jobs, in May. Since January, the unemployment rate has declined by 0.5 percentage point, and the number of unemployed has decreased by 774,000. This is the lowest level of unemployment since 2001. The labor force participation rate declined by 0.2 percentage point to 62.7 percent in May but has shown no clear trend over the past 12 months. The employment-population ratio edged down to 60.0 percent in May. Among the major worker groups, the unemployment rate for Whites edged down to 3.7 percent in May. The jobless rates for Blacks (7.5 percent), Asians (3.6 percent), and Hispanics (5.2 percent), as well as those for adult men (3.8 percent), adult women (4.0 percent), and teenagers (14.3 percent), showed little or no change. The change in employment for March 2017 was revised from 79,000 to 50,000 jobs added while April 2017 was revised from 211,000 to 174,000 jobs added. With the revisions, employment gains in these two months were 66,000 jobs less than previously reported.]]>