Question

Please answer the following questions:

1- Summarize the Household Survey Data section of the news release (page #1-#2).

2- Summarize the Establishment Survey Data section of the new release (page #2-#3).

3- Is the downward trend in unemployment due to higher employment or higher amount of discouraged workers?

4- How do you think the new unemployment numbers may affect the national inflation rate?

Use the following link as the source:

DATA AVAILABLE IN THE FOLLOWING LINK

https://www.bls.gov/news.release/pdf/empsit.pdf

Answer 1

1. The unemployment rate had been unchanged at 4.1 percent for consecutive fifth month but for blacks it has declined to 6.9% while long term unemployment has been unchanged at 1.4 million. Labour force participation has increased by 0.3%, while there has been little change in the persons employed part time. There were 373,000 discouraged workers down by 149,000 from a year earlier. The above data reveals that there has been no significant rise in the employment rate though the rate of discouraged workers has decreased substantially.
2. Employment in the construction had increased by 61000 while in retail trade it had increased by 50000 over the month. Employment in professional and business services increased by 50,000, Manufacturing added 31,000 jobs, Financial activities added 28,000 jobs. There has been little increase in the mining employment while in health care 290000 jobs has been added over the past year. There has been little change in the employment of wholesale trade, transportation and warehousing, information, leisure and hospitality, and government. The average workweek for all employees had increased from 0.1 hour to 34.5 hours. The same has increased in manufacturing and production and nonsupervisory employees from 0.2 hour to 41.0 hours and 0.2 hour to 33.8 hours respectively.