Life on the Road – Trucking News Blog

New Employment numbers came out. The number you will hear is that unemployment is holding steady at 4.5 percent.

What you may not hear is that manufacturing jobs declined. Food services and drinking places increased, hospital employment increased and “Employment in social assistance continued to rise; the industry added 32,000 jobs over the last 3 months.”

Wait. Social assistance increased their jobs by 32,000? Could it be that everyone was anticipating all the “new citizens” would need help in getting social assistance? Probably not. I’m sure it must be something else.

Manufacturing employment continued to decline in May (-19,000), reflecting a large job loss in motor vehicles and parts (-10,000) and smaller declines in other industries. Over the year, manufacturing lost 164,000 jobs; nearly half were in the motor vehicle and parts industry. Average weekly hours and overtime in factories each fell by 0.1 hour in May to 41.0 and 4.1 hours, respectively.

Construction was holding steady.

Average hourly pay rose 6 cents to $17.30 an hour.

Not horrible, but manufacturing could be better. I wish I could find the stat I heard that unskilled labor unemployment was at 17 percent. Of course that had nothing to do with the unlimited supply of unskilled labor. Until I find that, it’s only a rumor you heard here first.