Thread by @prchovanec

Preoccupied with the coming July 4 weekend last Friday, I didn't do a download of the June employment report. So I'll rectify that, before any more time goes by.

The US economy added +850,000 new jobs in June. That is still -6.8 million jobs below February 2020.

The unemployment rate rose slightly in June to 5.9%.

The labor force participation rate remained largely unchanged at a (depressed) 61.6%, meaning a lot of people who were employed pre-COVID are still not actively seeking jobs.

Due to huge swings in employment, average hourly wages have been all over the map. But for what it's worth, in June they were up +3.6% over a year before.

Job gains in April were revised down by -9,000 (to +269,000), and the change for May was revised up by +24,000 (to +583,000).

Average monthly jobs gains for the first half of the year were +543,000, for a total of over +3.2 million jobs recovered so far this year.

Leisure and hospitality added +343,000 jobs in June, over half of which (+194k) were in restaurants and bars. Employment in leisure and hospitality is still down by -2.2 million, or -12.9%, from its level in February 2020.

In June, employment rose by +155,000 in local government education, +75,000 in state government education, and by +39,000 in private education. Since February 2020, employment is still down by -414,000, -168,000, and -255,000 in these areas respectively.

Professional and business services added +72,000 jobs in June, but is down -633,000 since February 2020.

Retail trade added +67,000 jobs in June, but employment is down by -303,000, or -1.9%, since February 2020.

Employment in manufacturing rose +15,000 in June, but is down -481,000 from its level in February 2020.

Transportation and warehousing added +11,000 jobs in June, but is down -94,000 since February 2020.

Construction lost -7,000 jobs in June, and is down -238,000 from February 2020. Losses in nonresidential and civil engineering construction were partly offset by gains in residential construction.

As someone helpfully noted, the employment-to-population ratio for prime working age Americans has steadily (if only partially) recovered, so some of what we are seeing with the depressed labor force participation rate may be older people retiring, prompted by COVID.

Note the employment-to-population ratio for Americans age 65 and older without disability. After an initial snap-back of around 50%, many of the rest appear to be staying out of the labor market, post-COVID.