- Disappointing September jobs report has been released by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.
- US Leisure and Hospitality sector saw relatively few jobs added in September.
- Uneven gains are largely attributed to the virus variant that affected travel at summer’s end.
U.S. Travel issued the following statement today on the September jobs report released by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics:
“Today’s employment analysis points to an uneven recovery for the critically important Leisure and Hospitality sector, which saw relatively few jobs added in September (just 74,000) compared to earlier months where hundreds of thousands of jobs were recovered. These uneven gains are largely attributed to the virus variant that affected travel at summer’s end.
“There remains a great need for Congress to provide additional federal relief and incentives to sustain travel-dependent businesses until a complete recovery can take hold – which will require the return of business travel as well as international inbound travel.”
According to the September jobs report, U.S. economy created jobs at a much slower-than-expected pace in September, a pessimistic sign about the state of the economy though the total was held back substantially by a sharp drop in government employment.
Nonfarm payrolls rose by just 194,000 in the month, compared with the Dow Jones estimate of 500,000, the Labor Department reported.
Despite the weak jobs total, wages increased sharply. The monthly gain of 0.6% pushed the year-over-year rise to 4.6% as companies use wage increases to combat the persistent labor shortage. The available workforce declined by 183,000 in September and is 3.1 million shy of where it was in February 2020, just before the pandemic was declared.
The report comes at a critical time for the economy, with recent data showing solid consumer spending despite rising prices, growth in the manufacturing and services sector, and surging housing costs.
