U.S. payrolls rose 50,000 in December, less than expected; unemployment rate falls to 4.4%

[BumRushDaShow]

Source: CNBC

Published Fri, Jan 9 2026 8:31 AM EST Updated 19 Min Ago


The U.S. labor market ended 2025 on a soft note, with job creation in December less than expected, according to a report Friday from the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

Nonfarm payrolls rose a seasonally adjusted 50,000 for the month, lower than the downwardly revised 56,000 in November and short of the Dow Jones estimate for 73,000.

At the same time, the unemployment rate fell to 4.4%, compared to the forecast for 4.5%.



A more encompassing measure that includes discouraged workers and those holding part-time jobs for economic reasons dropped to 8.4%, down 0.3 percentage point from November. The household survey, which is used to calculate the unemployment figures, showed an increase of 232,000 while the labor force participation rate edged lower to 62.4%.

Read more: https://www.cnbc.com/2026/01/09/jobs-report-december-2025.html

---

From the source -

Link to tweet

BLS-Labor Statistics
@BLS_gov
·
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Both payroll employment (+50,000) and unemployment rate (4.4%) change little in December #BLSData https://bls.gov/news.release/archives/empsit_01092026.htm
8:31 AM · Jan 9, 2026

Article updated.

Previous articles -

Published Fri, Jan 9 2026 8:31 AM EST Updated 1 Min Ago


The U.S. labor market ended 2025 on a soft note, with job creation in December less than expected, according to a report Friday from the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

Nonfarm payrolls rose a seasonally adjusted 50,000 for the month, lower than the downwardly revised 56,000 in November and short of the Dow Jones estimate for 73,000.

At the same time, the unemployment rate fell to 4.4%, compared to the forecast for 4.5%.

Published Fri, Jan 9 2026 8:31 AM EST Updated 6 Min Ago


December less than expected, according to a report Friday from the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

Nonfarm payrolls rose a seasonally adjusted 50,000 for the month, lower than the downwardly revised 56,000 in November and short of the Dow Jones estimate for 73,000.

At the same time, the unemployment rate fell to 4.4%, compared to the forecast for 4.5%.


This is breaking news. Please refresh for updates.

Original article/headline -

U.S. payrolls rose 50,000 in December, less than expected; unemployment rate at 4.4

Published Fri, Jan 9 2026 8:31 AM EST


Nonfarm payrolls were expected to rise by 73,000 in December as the unemployment rate moved lower to 4.5%, according to the Dow Jones consensus estimate.


This is breaking news. Please refresh for updates.

[lostincalifornia]

1. The jackass has created a no fire no hire economy in the private sector.

[NoMoreRepugs]

2. 4.4% unemployment while the U.S. economy is losing jobs?

[BumRushDaShow]

3. I know progree will be around shortly but I think one factor is the "Labor Participation Rate"

and that would impact the UE %.

[progree]

30. #29 a little ways below /nt

[BumRushDaShow]

31. ...

[DBoon]

15. could be an effect of mass deportations

You shrink the labor force while we lose jobs, the net effect could be a steady unemployment rate.

We are exporting our labor force.

[progree]

29. Yes. The St. Louis Fed estimates only a net 57k jobs/month (+/- 25k) need to be created, down from the old 150k number

Lower Immigration Projections Mean Lower Breakeven Employment Growth Estimates, Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis, 8/28/25
https://www.stlouisfed.org/on-the-economy/2025/aug/lower-immigration-projections-mean-lower-breakeven-employment-growth

In April this year, St. Louis Fed economist Victoria Gregory and I provided an estimate for breakeven employment growth—the number of jobs the economy needs to add each month to keep the unemployment rate steady. Using Congressional Budget Office (CBO) projections from January, we estimated that the U.S. economy needed to add more than 150,000 jobs per month to maintain a stable unemployment rate.1

Since then, new immigration projections have dramatically changed the picture. The bottom line: With much lower expected immigration for 2025, I now estimate breakeven employment growth has fallen to a range between 32,000 and 82,000 jobs per month. ((that's 57k +/- 25k -progree))

As for today's report of 50k net new payroll jobs, while unemployment rate ticked down 0.1 percentage points, 3 reasons:

1./ The above


2./ The 2 numbers come from different surveys -- the 50k number comes from the Establishment Survey, while the unemployment rate and labor force participation rate come from the Household Survey. The payroll jobs number sampling error: +/- 136,000 at 90% confidence interval And the unemployed numbers are +/- 300,000 (and +/- 0.2% for the unemployment rate).
http://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.tn.htm
Note, this is just the sampling error. There are other errors besides sampling error.

Correspondingly, again based on sampling error alone, there is a 50% chance that it is within +/- 55,800, and a 50% chance that it is outside that. So, for example for a reported job gain of 100,000, there is a 50% chance that it is between 44,200 and 155,800, and a 50% chance that it is outside that range based on sampling error alone. Note there are errors other than sampling error that add to the uncertainty


3./ As BRDS said, the labor force participation rate is a big factor in changing the unemployment rate. The labor force fell by 46k in December.
https://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS11000000?output_view=net_1mth

[progree]

4. Actually nonfarm payroll employment FELL by 192,000, but were seasonally adjusted upwards to +50,000

Last edited Fri Jan 9, 2026, 10:06 AM - Edit history (2)

Not Seasonally Adjusted: -192,000 in December
https://data.bls.gov/timeseries/CEU0000000001?output_view=net_1mth

Seasonally Adjusted: +50,000 in December
https://data.bls.gov/timeseries/CES0000000001?output_view=net_1mth

The seasonal adjustment in December is always in a big upward direction (in contrast to the ones in August, September, October, and November, which are historically downward revisions)

December is a very poor month for actual (meaning not seasonally adjusted) net job gains , most are negative.
https://data.bls.gov/timeseries/CEU0000000001?output_view=net_1mth
In the last 10 years: in thousands of jobs (i use double minus to make the negative ones stand out more) :
--213, --249, --201, --248, --513, +197, --309, --122, +41, --192

(January is a helluva lot worse: --2972, --2878, --3096, -2952, and so on)
====================================================

Back to seasonally adjusted numbers -- The previous 2 months were revised down by 76,000 combined.
So we have 26,000 fewer nonfarm payroll jobs than in the report that came out December 16. ( 50k - 76k = -26k )

https://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.nr0.htm

The change in total nonfarm payroll employment for October was revised down by 68,000, from
-105,000 to -173,000, and the change for November was revised down by 8,000, from +64,000 to
+56,000. With these revisions, employment in October and November combined is 76,000 lower
than previously reported.

Double check, from Table B-1, total nonfarm payroll jobs:

December 16 report, https://www.bls.gov/news.release/archives/empsit_12162025.htm
159,552,000 jobs in November

Today's January 9, 2026 report, https://www.bls.gov/news.release/archives/empsit_01092026.htm
159,526,000 in December

159,526,000 - 159,552,000 = -26,000

This is nicht gut, Mein Fuhrer!

[FakeNoose]

5. Mostly temp jobs, am I right?

Amazon was probably hiring home delivery drivers, but they'll get laid off soon. Same with UPS and Fedex Ground.

[Wiz Imp]

7. Not necessarily. UPS, FedEx & Amazon increases are accounted for by the Seasonal Adjustment.

Transportaiton and warehousing (the industry sector where those companies are located) actually showed an SA drop in December of 6600 jobs.

[SergeStorms]

26. I'm guessing all the hirng....

are fascist ICE agents.

[Johnny2X2X]

6. Looking at the graph

The last 8 months have been a disaster. Just an extended period of no job growth. All the gains the middle class saw under Biden being eaten up in short order.

[BumRushDaShow]

8. The October massive drop (fed "Fork in the Road" disaster)

was what needed to be glossed over with the reporting delays but is now showing up in the chart.

[Johnny2X2X]

9. Under Biden

I'm old enough to remember when Joe Biden was President and he once missed a jobs report badly, but it still was +160,000 jobs. The news media treated it like a national crisis, "Biggest jobs miss ever, US only adds 160,000 jobs!!!!" It dominated the news for several days, both national and local.

And here we are with 8 months under Trump where the economy added less than that 160,000 jobs combined and it's barely a blip. Job growth has ground to a halt in the US, it's a complete disaster! This is a price that workers will pay, they're losing their jobs, they're having trouble finding new ones, and the new ones now don't have to pay as well because there are more job seekers.

To go 8 months with essentially 0 job growth is unreal. It's a crisis and the media is ignoring it because the media is corporate and administration owned.

[BumRushDaShow]

12. This tells it all

(from Wikipedia - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jobs_created_during_U.S._presidential_terms with data from the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis - https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/PAYEMS)

[progree]

20. "this tells it all" - yes it does. I like that it's percent change, and that it is annualized

Last edited Fri Jan 9, 2026, 12:05 PM - Edit history (1)

Until now, all I've ever seen is job creation in thousands by each president .

First this is unfair to early presidents. For example, the labor force (in thousands) under Truman was about half of what it is today. But by looking at their records as percent change, that fixes that distortion.

Second, 2-term presidents have an advantage over 1-term presidents, and even more so over less-than-one-term presidents like JFK, the way some of these graphs are -- as generally more jobs are created in 8 years than in 4 years (or nearly 3 years by JFK). By annualizing the numbers, that gets rid of that distortion

[wolfie001]

21. Brilliant! Thanks

rePUKES rely on religion and ratfucking. Both go hand-in-hand

[Skittles]

27. striking

yup

[Wiz Imp]

10. Yes. April level 159433. December 159526

That represents a total gain of 93,000 jobs over the past 8 months, which is an average of just 11,625 jobs per month.

Since Trump took office in January, total job gain has been 473,000, an average of 43,000 per month. As a comparison, the final 11 months of the Biden administration saw a gain of 1,782,000 jobs, an average of 162,000 per month. So in just 11 months of Trump, average monthly job growth has fallen by about 75%.

[Johnny2X2X]

16. 11,625 jobs a month!

And this isn't some one off. This is 8 months of data.

The media would have burned Biden in effigy with these jobs reports. And it was a booming economy and jobs market trump took over, his tariffs and war on working people did this.

[Texin]

11. Yeah, no. I'm not buying it.

[mahatmakanejeeves]

13. Aaron Rupar's video clips of administration talking heads trying to change the subject:

https://bsky.app/profile/atrupar.com

[BumRushDaShow]

18. This one?

it's almost like there is no boom

— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar.com) 2026-01-09T14:21:19.380Z

[peppertree]

22. That smarmy imp puts the ass in Hassett

Probably knows a lot of the same rent boys Lindsey knows.

[mdbl]

14. Data is from the BLS - already gutted of intelligent people by pres dump.

[peppertree]

23. That - or he has his "supervisors" keep an eye on them numbers

[progree]

17. Links to data series

And yes, the monthly increases are net gains. The reported nonfarm payroll jobs increases are jobs created and job openings filled minus jobs lost: https://www.democraticunderground.com/10143221098#post24

AND SEASONALLY ADJUSTED - pretty much all the numbers you see reported in the media or BLS summary are the seasonally adjusted ones -- that certainly is true of the headline numbers -- nonfarm payroll jobs, unemployment rate -- as well as many others like the labor force participation rate. (I'm tired of seeing comments like the payroll jobs number is high this time because we're getting into the holiday hiring season, or low because we're done with the holiday season, or it's slow in August etc. Seasonal adjustments adjust for these seasonal cycles - that's why they are called seasonal adjustments)

BLS news release summary: https://bls.gov/news.release/empsit.nr0.htm

The headline payroll job numbers (+50,000 in DECEMBER) come from the Establishment Survey
https://data.bls.gov/timeseries/CES0000000001
Monthly changes (in thousands): https://data.bls.gov/timeseries/CES0000000001?output_view=net_1mth
YEAR: JAN FEB MAR etc.
2022: 225 869 471 305 241 461 696 237 227 400 297 126
2023: 444 306 85 216 227 257 148 157 158 186 141 269
2024: 119 222 246 118 193 87 88 71 240 44 261 323
2025: 111 102 120 158 19 -13 72 -26 108 -173 56 50
The last 2 months (November and December) are preliminary, subject to revisions
Last 8 months: +93,000 jobs = +11,625 per month average

# Employed in thousands (up 232,000 in DECEMBER) come from the separate Household Survey, http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS12000000
Monthly changes (in thousands): http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS12000000?output_view=net_1mth
If one adjusts the date range from 2021 to 2025, the graph is much more meaningful because it leaves out the huge swings of 2020 that greatly enlarges the Y axis and makes what follows look like tiny almost undiscernible squiggles around the zero axis
YEAR: JAN FEB MAR etc.
2022 1028(1) 573(1) 584 --386 541 --308 222 437 70 --143 --187 718
2023 971(1) 284(1) 391 79 --115 161 273 239 --34 --253 665 --805
2024 75(1) --50(1) 379 --24 --258 --28 145 132 384 --369 --285 427
2025 2245(1) --493(1) 171 389 --654 83 --187 230 286 (9) (9) 232
1 : Data affected by changes in population controls.
9 : Data unavailable due to the 2025 lapse in appropriations.
Last 8 months (December total minus April total, from http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS12000000 :
+94,000 jobs = +11,750 jobs/month average
Hmm, happens to almost exactly match the nonfarm payrolls number for the 8-month period. This is rare
A very volatile data series from month to month. I used a double minus to make the negative ones stand out a little better
This Household Survey also produces the unemployment rate and labor force participation rate among many other stats

REVISIONS of the prior 2 months of Payroll Jobs: DOWN 76,000, from the BLS news release:
https://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.nr0.htm

The change in total nonfarm payroll employment for October was revised down by 68,000, from
-105,000 to -173,000, and the change for November was revised down by 8,000, from +64,000 to
+56,000. With these revisions, employment in October and November combined is 76,000 lower
than previously reported.

So compared to the report that came out one month ago we have 50,000 - 76,000 = -26,000 net new payroll jobs reported.

Double check, from Table B-1, total nonfarm payroll jobs:

December 16 report, https://www.bls.gov/news.release/archives/empsit_12162025.htm
159,552,000 jobs in November

Today's January 9, 2026 report, https://www.bls.gov/news.release/archives/empsit_01092026.htm
159,526,000 in December

159,526,000 - 159,552,000 = -26,000

###############################################################
###############################################################

LINKS to some BLS Data Series Numbers and Graphs

Table A - Summary of Household Survey (produces unemployment rate, labor force participation rate) - https://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.a.htm

Table B - Summary of Establishment Survey (produces the headline payroll jobs number and the average earnings) - https://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.b.htm

Every one of these data series comes with a table and graph:

# Nonfarm Employment (Establishment Survey, https://data.bls.gov/timeseries/CES0000000001
Monthly changes (in thousands): https://data.bls.gov/timeseries/CES0000000001?output_view=net_1mth
   NOT SEASONALLY ADJUSTED: https://data.bls.gov/timeseries/CEU0000000001

# Employed in thousands from the separate Household Survey, http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS12000000
Monthly changes (in thousands): http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS12000000?output_view=net_1mth
   NOT SEASONALLY ADJUSTED: https://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNU02000000

# Nonfarm PRIVATE Employment (Establishment Survey, https://data.bls.gov/timeseries/CES0500000001
Monthly changes: https://data.bls.gov/timeseries/CES0500000001?output_view=net_1mth
    ^-Good for comparison to the ADP report that typically comes out a few days earlier
NOT SEASONALLY ADJUSTED: https://data.bls.gov/timeseries/CEU0500000001

Earnings of Production and Non-Supervisor Workers (PANSW)
. . . # INFLATION ADJUSTED Hourly Earnings of PANSW http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/CES0500000032
. . . # INFLATION ADJUSTED Weekly Earnings of PANSW http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/CES0500000031
----- Nominal means NOT inflation adjusted. Just plain ordinary greenbacks ----
. . . # Nominal Hourly Earnings of PANSW- http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/CES0500000008
. . . # Nominal Weekly Earnings of PANSW - http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/CES0500000030

# Labor Force http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS11000000?output_view=net_1mth

The labor force is the sum of employed and unemployed. To count as unemployed, one must have actively sought work in the past 4 weeks (just looking at want ads and job postings doesn't count)

# ETPR (Employment-To-Population Ratio) aka Employment Rate http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS12300000

# LFPR (Labor Force Participation rate) http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS11300000

Unemployed, Unemployment Rate
# Unemployed http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS13000000
# Unemployment rate http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS14000000
    # Black unemployment rate (%), https://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS14000006
    # Hispanic or Latino unemployment rate (%), https://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS14000009
    # White unemployment rate (%), https://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS14000003
# U-6 unemployment rate http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS13327709
# Long term unemployed 27 weeks or longer as a percent of total unemployed http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS13025703
------------ end unemployed, unemployment rates --------

# NILF -- Not in Labor Force http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS15000000

# NILF-WJ -- Not in Labor Force, Wants Job http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS15026639

# Part-Time Workers who want Full-Time Jobs (Table A-8's Part-Time For Economic Reasons) http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS12032194

# Part-Time Workers (Table A-9) http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS12600000

# Full-Time Workers (Table A-9) http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS12500000

# Multiple Job holders (Table A-9) - http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS12026619

# Multiple Jobholders as a Percent of Employed (Table A-9) https://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS12026620

# Civilian non-institutional population
Seasonally adjusted (they seem to have gotten rid of this) https://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS10000000
NOT seasonally adjusted: https://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNU00000000
. . In Table A-1 https://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.t01.htm they show the same numbers for seasonally adjusted and non-seasonally adjusted

LFPR - Labor Force Participation Rate for some age groups
The LFPR is the Employed + jobless people who have looked for work in the last 4 weeks (and say they want a job and are able to take one if offered. Looking for work involves more than just looking at job listings). All divided by the civilian non-institutional population age 16+ (in the case of the regular LFPR, or divided by the civilian non-institutional population of whatever age, gender, race etc. for the various sub-demographic measures. For example. the LFPR of age 25-54 females is the number of those employed or actively seeking work divided by the civilian non-institutional population of age 25-54 females.)

SA means Seasonally adjusted. NSA means Not Seasonally Adjusted
16+: SA: http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS11300000 NSA: http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNU01300000
25-34: SA: http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS11300089 NSA: http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNU01300089
25-54 ("Prime Age" ): SA: http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS11300060 NSA: http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNU01300060
. . . . . . Prime Age Men: SA: http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS11300061
. . . . . . . . . . . .From Jan 1960 to Jan 2025, Prime Age Men LFPR went from 97.1% to 89.4%. That means that the percent not in the labor force went from 2.9% to 10.6%, a 3.7 fold increase in this proportion.
. . . . . . Prime Age Women: SA: http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS11300062
55-64: -------------------- NSA: https://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNU01300095
55+: SA: http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS11324230 NSA: http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNU01324230
65+: SA: ---------------- NSA: http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNU01300097

LFPR - Labor Force Particpation Rate (prime age 25-54) by gender
All: http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS11300060
Men: http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS11300061
Women: http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS11300062

Labor force level (thousands) age 25-54 ("Prime Age" ) http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS11000060

More LFPR links including by race: https://www.democraticunderground.com/111695870

ETPR - Employment to Population Ratio for some age groups
SA means Seasonally adjusted. NSA means Not Seasonally Adjusted
16+: SA: http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS12300000 NSA: http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNU02300000
25-34: http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS12300089 NSA: http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNU02300089
25-54 ("Prime Age" ): SA: http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS12300060 NSA: http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNU02300060
55-64: SA: ---------------- NSA: https://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNU02300095
55+: SA: http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS12324230 NSA: http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNU02324230
65+: SA: ---------------- NSA: http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNU02300097

Data series finder (employment/unemployment related): https://www.bls.gov/data/#employment

The entire report: http://www.bls.gov/news.release/pdf/empsit.pdf

Inflation rate (CPI)
. . . Monthly report: https://www.bls.gov/news.release/cpi.nr0.htm
. . . Regular CPI: https://data.bls.gov/timeseries/CUSR0000SA0?output_view=pct_1mth
. . . Core CPI: http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/CUSR0000SA0L1E?output_view=pct_1mth
. . . Energy: https://data.bls.gov/timeseries/CUSR0000SA0E?output_view=pct_1mth
. . . Food: https://data.bls.gov/timeseries/CUSR0000SAF1?output_view=pct_1mth
. . . Food at home (groceries): https://data.bls.gov/timeseries/CUSR0000SAF11?output_view=pct_1mth
. . . Calculator at: https://www.bls.gov/data/inflation_calculator.htm
. . . One Screen Data Search for CPI components: https://data.bls.gov/PDQWeb/cu

Grocery prices (food at home) inflation compared to overall inflation rate
. . . . . https://www.in2013dollars.com/Food-at-home/price-inflation
. . . From 1947 to 2021 and from 2000 to 2021, food at home inflation very slightly lagged the overall inflation rate
. . . . . https://www.democraticunderground.com/10142735789


Archives of previous reports - The monthly payroll employment reports from the BLS are archived at Archived News Releases (https://www.bls.gov/bls/news-release/ ). In the list up at the top, under Major Economic Indicators, select Employment Situation ( https://www.bls.gov/bls/news-release/empsit.htm ). That opens up links to reports going back to 1994.

[mahatmakanejeeves]

19. Both payroll employment (+50,000) and unemployment rate (4.4%) change little in December

Both payroll employment (+50,000) and unemployment rate (4.4%) change little in December
Both total nonfarm payroll employment (+50,000) and the unemployment rate (4.4 percent) changed little in December. Employment continued to trend up in food services and drinking places, health care, and social assistance. Retail trade lost jobs.

Economic News Release USDL-26-0020
Employment Situation Summary
Transmission of material in this news release is embargoed until 8:30 a.m. (ET) Friday, January 9, 2026

Technical information:
Household data: [phone] * [e-mail] * www.bls.gov/cps
Establishment data: [phone] * [e-mail] * www.bls.gov/ces

Media contact: [phone] * [e-mail]


THE EMPLOYMENT SITUATION -- DECEMBER 2025


Both total nonfarm payroll employment (+50,000) and the unemployment rate (4.4 percent) changed little in December, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported today. Employment continued to trend up in food services and drinking places, health care, and social assistance. Retail trade lost jobs.

This news release presents statistics from two monthly surveys. The household survey measures labor force status, including unemployment, by demographic characteristics. The establishment survey measures nonfarm employment, hours, and earnings by industry. For more information about the concepts and statistical methodology used in these two surveys, see the Technical Note.

_____________________________________________________________________________________________
|
| Revision of Seasonally Adjusted Household Survey Data
|
| Seasonally adjusted household survey data have been revised using updated seasonal
| adjustment factors, a procedure done at the end of each calendar year. Seasonally adjusted
| estimates back to January 2021 were subject to revision. The unemployment rates for January
| 2025 through November 2025 (as originally published and as revised), along with additional
| information about the revisions, appear in table A at the end of this news release.
|_____________________________________________________________________________________________


Household Survey Data

Both the unemployment rate, at 4.4 percent, and the number of unemployed people, at 7.5 million, changed little in December. (See table A-1.)

Among the major worker groups, the unemployment rates for adult men (3.9 percent), adult women (3.9 percent), teenagers (15.7 percent), Whites (3.8 percent), Blacks (7.5 percent), Asians (3.6 percent), and Hispanics (4.9 percent) showed little or no change over the month. (See tables A-1, A-2, and A-3.)

The number of people jobless less than 5 weeks edged down to 2.3 million in December. The number of long-term unemployed (those jobless for 27 weeks or more) changed little over the month at 1.9 million but is up by 397,000 over the year. The long-term unemployed accounted for 26.0 percent of all unemployed people in December. (See table A-12.)

Both the labor force participation rate, at 62.4 percent, and the employment-population ratio, at 59.7 percent, changed little in December. These measures have shown little change over the year. (See table A-1.)

The number of people employed part time for economic reasons, at 5.3 million, changed little in December but is up by 980,000 over the year. These individuals would have preferred full-time employment but were working part time because their hours had been reduced or they were unable to find full-time jobs. (See table A-8.)

The number of people not in the labor force who currently want a job was little changed at 6.2 million in December but is up by 684,000 over the year. These individuals were not counted as unemployed because they were not actively looking for work during the 4 weeks preceding the survey or were unavailable to take a job. (See table A-1.)

Among those not in the labor force who wanted a job, the number of people marginally attached to the labor force changed little at 1.8 million in December. These individuals wanted and were available for work and had looked for a job sometime in the prior 12 months but had not looked for work in the 4 weeks preceding the survey. The number of discouraged workers, a subset of the marginally attached who believed that no jobs were available for them, decreased by 183,000 in December to 461,000. (See Summary table A.)

Establishment Survey Data

Total nonfarm payroll employment changed little in December (+50,000). Employment continued to trend up in food services and drinking places, health care, and social assistance. Retail trade lost jobs. Payroll employment rose by 584,000 in 2025 (an average monthly gain of 49,000), less than the increase of 2.0 million in 2024 (an average monthly gain of 168,000).(See table B-1.)

Employment in food services and drinking places continued to trend up in December (+27,000).Food services and drinking places added an average of 12,000 jobs per month in 2025, similar to the average increase of 11,000 jobs per month in 2024.

Health care employment continued its upward trend in December (+21,000), with a gain of 16,000 jobs in hospitals. Health care employment rose by an average of 34,000 per month in 2025, less than the average monthly gain of 56,000 in 2024.

In December, employment in social assistance continued to trend up (+17,000), mostly in individual and family services (+13,000).

Retail trade lost 25,000 jobs in December. Over the month, employment declined in warehouse
clubs, supercenters, and other general merchandise retailers (-19,000) and in food and beverage retailers (-9,000). Electronics and appliance retailers added 5,000 jobs. Retail trade employment showed little net change in both 2024 and 2025.

Federal government employment was little changed in December (+2,000). Since reaching a peak in January, federal government employment is down by 277,000, or 9.2 percent. (Employees on paid leave or receiving ongoing severance pay are counted as employed in the establishment survey.)

Employment showed little or no change over the month in other major industries, including.mining, quarrying, and oil and gas extraction; construction; manufacturing; wholesale trade; transportation and warehousing; information; financial activities; professional and business services; and other services.

In December, average hourly earnings for all employees on private nonfarm payrolls rose by 12 cents, or 0.3 percent, to $37.02. Over the past 12 months, average hourly earnings have increased by 3.8 percent. In December, average hourly earnings of private-sector production and nonsupervisory employees, at $31.76, changed little (+3 cents). (See tables B-3 and B-8.)

The average workweek for all employees on private nonfarm payrolls edged down by 0.1 hour to 34.2 hours in December. In manufacturing, the average workweek edged down by 0.2 hour to 39.9 hours, and overtime was unchanged at 2.9 hours. The average workweek for production and nonsupervisory employees on private nonfarm payrolls remained at 33.7 hours. (See tables B-2 and B-7.)

The change in total nonfarm payroll employment for October was revised down by 68,000, from -105,000 to -173,000, and the change for November was revised down by 8,000, from +64,000 to +56,000. With these revisions, employment in October and November combined is 76,000 lower than previously reported. (Monthly revisions result from additional reports received from businesses and government agencies since the last published estimates and from the recalculation of seasonal factors.)

_____________
The Employment Situation for January is scheduled to be released on Friday, February 6, 2026, at 8:30 a.m. (ET).


_____________________________________________________________________________________________
| |
| Household Survey Estimates and the Federal Government Shutdown
| |
| The federal government shutdown did not impact the collection of household survey data for
| December 2025. The household survey returned to the usual composite weighting methodology
| in December. The impact of the November weighting change on the standard error for the
| December unemployment rate was negligible.
|
| Household survey data for the fourth quarter of 2025 were not produced. Due to the federal
| government shutdown, household survey data were not collected for October 2025. Reliable
| estimates for the fourth quarter of 2025 could not be produced without one-third of the
| data used for a quarterly estimate.
|
| Annual estimates of 2025 household survey data were produced using 11-month averages that
| exclude October. As a result, 2025 annual estimates are not strictly comparable with
| annual averages for other years.
|
| Additional information about the impact of the shutdown on the household survey is
| available online at
| www.bls.gov/cps/methods/2025-federal-government-shutdown-impact-cps.htm.
|_____________________________________________________________________________________________


_____________________________________________________________________________________________
|
| Upcoming Changes to Establishment Survey Data
|
| Effective with the release of The Employment Situation for January 2026 on February 6,
| 2026, nonfarm payroll employment, hours, and earnings data from the establishment survey
| will be revised to reflect the annual benchmark process and updated seasonal adjustment
| factors. Not seasonally adjusted data beginning with April 2024 and seasonally adjusted
| data beginning with January 2021 are subject to revision. Consistent with standard
| practice, additional historical data may be revised as a result of the benchmark process.
| |
| Also effective with the release of January 2026 data, the establishment survey will change
| the birth-death model by incorporating current sample information each month. The change
| follows the same methodology applied to the April through October 2024 forecasts during
| the 2024 post-benchmark period (see question 9 in the CES Birth-Death Model Frequently
| Asked Questions page at www.bls.gov/web/empsit/cesbdqa.htm).
|_____________________________________________________________________________________________


_____________________________________________________________________________________________
| |
| Population Control Adjustments to the Household Survey |
|
| The annual population control adjustments that are usually incorporated with the release
| of January estimates in February will instead be introduced with the release of February
| 2026 estimates in March. Consequently, the initial January 2026 household survey estimates
| will continue to use short-term projections of monthly population estimates derived from
| population adjustments introduced in January 2025 (based on Vintage 2024 population
| estimates provided by the U.S. Census Bureau). As soon as practicable, BLS plans to revise
| January 2026 estimates to incorporate the updated population controls. Additional
| information will be announced at www.bls.gov/cps/documentation.htm#pop.
|_____________________________________________________________________________________________


Revision of Seasonally Adjusted Household Survey Data

At the end of each calendar year, BLS updates the seasonal adjustment factors for the national
labor force series derived from the household survey. As a result of this process, seasonally
adjusted data for January 2021 through November 2025 were subject to revision. (Not seasonally
adjusted data were not subject to revision.)

Table A shows the unemployment rates for January 2025 through November 2025, excluding October
2025, as first published and as revised. (Household survey data were not collected for October
2025 due to the federal government shutdown.) The unemployment rate changed by one-tenth of a
percentage point in 4 of the 10 months and was unchanged in the remaining 6 months. Revised
seasonally adjusted data for other major labor force series back to December 2024 appear in
table B.

More information on this year's revisions to seasonally adjusted household series is available
at www.bls.gov/web/empsit/cps-seas-adjustment-methodology.pdf. Detailed information on the
seasonal adjustment methodology is found at www.bls.gov/cps/seasonal-adjustment-methodology.htm.

Historical data for the household series contained in the A tables (A-1 through A-16) of this
news release can be accessed at www.bls.gov/cps/cpsatabs.htm. Revised historical seasonally
adjusted data are available at www.bls.gov/cps/data.htm and
https://download.bls.gov/pub/time.series/ln.

{snip all kinds of tables}

[Javaman]

24. and in a couple of months, it will be revised down further as seems to be the case. nt

[BumRushDaShow]

25. They already had some revisions downward of previous data!

(although the up and down revisions are typical)

[progree]

28. Compare to Wednesday's ADP report of PRIVATE payrolls: ADP: +41k, BLS: +37k

Wednesday's ADP report of PRIVATE payrolls: +41,000
https://www.democraticunderground.com/10143594195
https://adpemploymentreport.com/


BLS report today: PRIVATE nonfarm payrolls: +37,000
https://data.bls.gov/timeseries/CES0500000001?output_view=net_1mth


So the two reports were unusually close this time.
ADP doesn't estimate government payrolls.
The headline BLS number (+50,000) includes government employees

[Wiz Imp]

32. Benchmark jobs data will be released with the next monthly release at the beginning of February.

We already know that March 2025 data will be revised downward by a likely significant amount (see attached press release from September). The monthly movements from the survey data will likely not change by a lot (due to the way the revised data is calculated) but I'd be shocked if the benchmark data don't show the gains under Trump to be even smaller than the pitifully small gains originally estimated/reported.

https://www.bls.gov/news.release/prebmk.nr0.htm

The preliminary estimate of the Current Employment Statistics (CES) national benchmark revision to total nonfarm employment for March 2025 is -911,000 (-0.6 percent), the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported today. The annual benchmark revisions over the last 10 years have an absolute average of 0.2 percent of total nonfarm employment. In accordance with usual practice, the final benchmark revision will be issued in February 2026 with the publication of the January 2026 Employment Situation news release.

Each year, CES employment estimates are benchmarked to comprehensive counts of employment from the Quarterly Census of Employment and Wages (QCEW). These counts are derived primarily from state unemployment insurance (UI) tax records that nearly all employers are required to file with state workforce agencies.

The preliminary benchmark revision reflects the difference between two independently derived employment counts, each subject to their own sources of error. It serves as a preliminary measure of the total error in CES employment estimates from March 2024 to March 2025. Preliminary research, which is not comprehensive and is subject to updates in QCEW data, indicates that the primary contributors to the overestimation of employment growth are likely the result of two sources—response error and nonresponse error. First, businesses reported less employment to the QCEW than they reported to the CES survey (response error). Second, businesses who were selected for the CES survey but did not respond reported less employment to the QCEW than those businesses who did respond to
the CES survey (nonresponse error). Estimates of other errors, such as the forecast error from the net birth-death model, are not available at this time. Information on how the net birth-death forecasts have reduced benchmark revisions historically are available on the CES Birth-Death Model Frequently Asked Questions page in question 10, ww.bls.gov/web/empsit/cesbdqa.htm.

Please note, the -911,000 revision is only to the MArch 2025 level. Other months are then recalculated off of that. Also note, that was just a prelimary estimate. The final revision could be larger or smaller. The 2024 benchmark revision ended up at -589,000 while the prelimnary estimated revision was -818,000.

Finally, be aware that assuming March 2025 is revised downward significantly, it will impact Biden's jobs record more than Trump's (because it only covers the first 2 months of Trump's administration). However, even in a worst case revision scenario, Biden's job creation numbers will remain significantly above Trump's and Trump's numbers will almost certainly be significantly worse than they have been so far.

[progree]

33. 🚨 President Literal Asswipe posted job numbers from the report the evening before 😬!

Trump posted unpublished jobs data early on social media, Bloomberg, 1/9/26
https://finance.yahoo.com/news/trump-posted-unpublished-jobs-data-184043351.html
((no paywall at this Yahoo-hosted article, and no you don't have to give your email address either -progree))

President Donald Trump posted a chart on social media Thursday evening that included figures in the yet-to-be released December employment report.

The chart, which showed the private sector added 654,000 jobs “since January,” matched figures that were not publicly published until 8:30 a.m. in Washington on Friday. It was posted on Truth Social about 12 hours before the data was set to be released. ((the chart also shows 181,000 fewer government jobs which the Krasnov administration is proud of -progree))

The US jobs data, published by the Bureau of Labor Statistics, are among the most closely guarded economic statistics and can move markets by trillions of dollars. However, trading in the bond and stock markets as well as Polymarket betting after the president’s post and before the release of the jobs report didn’t indicate a flurry of activity.

A White House official confirmed that there was an “inadvertent” public disclosure that partially derived from pre-released information. The official added that the administration is reviewing protocols for economic releases .

Trump was evasive when asked about the matter later on Friday — both distancing himself from the post and saying he has a habit of posting things. “I don’t know if they posted them, I said post them whenever you get a chance,” Trump told reporters during meeting with oil executives at the White House. “When people give me things, I post them.”

. . . It’s not the first time Trump hasn’t adhered to protocol. In his first term, ...

(bolding, highlighting, and emoticons added)

Note to BRDS: Next time, if you REALLY want to be first with the jobs report, check Truth Social the night before!

This gives more ammo to the KK! Brigade (the Krasnov Krasnov! Brigade)

I don't know if it's just the 2 numbers above, or if he posted more than those 2 numbers.

[BumRushDaShow]

34. "if you REALLY want to be first with the jobs report, check Truth Social the night before"

I ain't touching Devin MOOOves-run stuff! I'll let his cow do the honors!