#Bureau of Labor Statistice Employment Situation News Release
Total nonfarm payroll employment rose by 130,000 in January, and the unemployment rate changed
little at 4.3 percent, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported today. Job gains occurred in health care, social assistance, and construction, while federal government and financial activities lost jobs. …
Household Survey Data
Both the unemployment rate, at 4.3 percent, and the number of unemployed people, at 7.4 million, changed little in January. These measures are higher than a year earlier, when the jobless rate was 4.0 percent, and the number of unemployed people was 6.9 million.
Establishment Survey Data
Total nonfarm payroll employment rose by 130,000 in January. Job gains occurred in health care, social assistance, and construction, while federal government and financial activities lost jobs. Payroll employment changed little in 2025 (+15,000 per month on average)…
The methodology of the Establishment data was changed…[described in detail in the report]
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Employment has been level since early 2025 but January 2026 showed a nice little uptick.
Combined with the strong GDP numbers and sticky inflation the Fed will not be likely to cut the fed funds rate. Treasury yields jumped.
Everyone assumes that the employment report is honest…despite the firing of the head of the Bureau of Labor Statistics last year because of a bad employment report.
Do you think, for example, that there are more or fewer Federal government employees than there used to be? Do you find an increase in health care workers surprising?
I was thinking of the firing of Erika MacEntarfer last August solely because the bls posted numbers which displeased the powers that be and her replacement with a more compliant leader and my hesitancy to trust a corrupted system.
I figured it was your distrust of the present administration. More specifically though, are there some numbers that appear to you to be fudged or unrealistic?
Just look at 2025 revisions. Essentially all the reported job creations for 2025 were revised down. For 2025, the job growth is nill.
Whether it is the statistics collection issues, or fudging the current numbers needs to be taken with a pinch of salt and assume it is going to be revised down.
I wasn’t surprised that healthcare contributed to the majority of job gains. Boomers are getting older, everyone else is getting fatter. Technological advancements are also creating new and exciting job opportunities for nerds entering the healthcare industry.
I was surprised that construction added so many jobs. There is a worker shortage, but it’s not like non-residential specialty trades can just shat out new workers. Maybe they’re hiring a bunch of apprentices…
I posted a link to my new favorite macro site in a separate thread, lots of cool stuff. You can even see forecasts and users can vote on non-farm payroll projections!
