Advance copies of this statement are made available to the press 

under lock-up conditions with the explicit understanding that 

the data are embargoed until 8:30 a.m. Eastern Daylight Time. 

Statement of 

Keith Hall 

Commissioner 

Bureau of Labor Statistics 

Friday, October 7, 2011

Nonfarm payroll employment edged up by 103,000 in 

September, in part due to the return of about 45,000 

telecommunications workers following a strike in August. The 

unemployment rate remained at 9.1 percent. 

Since April, payroll employment has increased by an average 

of 72,000 per month, compared with an average increase of 

161,000 for the prior 7 months. As in recent months, September 

job gains were concentrated in a few major private-sector 

industries, while government employment continued to trend down. 

Health care employment increased by 44,000, with job gains 

in both ambulatory health care services and hospitals. Over the 

past 12 months, the health care industry has added 336,000 jobs. 

Employment in professional and business services increased 

by 48,000 in September. Small job gains occurred in a number of 

component industries, including temporary help services, 
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computer systems design, and management and technical 

consulting. 

Within the information industry, telecommunications 

employment was up in September; however, the increase resulted 

from the return of about 45,000 workers to their jobs following 

a strike in August. 

In the goods-producing sector, employment in construction 

increased by 26,000 over the month with nearly all the gain 

among the nonresidential industries, which includes heavy and 

civil construction. Since February, construction employment had 

shown little movement. Mining employment continued to trend up 

in September. Elsewhere in the private sector, employment was 

little changed. 

Government employment continued to trend down. Local 

government employment declined by 35,000 over the month. Since 

September 2008, employment in local government has fallen by 

535,000. The U.S. Postal Service lost 5,000 jobs over the 

month.

Average hourly earnings of all employees on private nonfarm 

payrolls rose by 4 cents in September, offsetting a decline of 

the same size in August. Over the past 12 months, average 

hourly earnings have risen by 1.9 percent. From August 2010 to 

August 2011, the Consumer Price Index for All Urban Consumers 

(CPI-U) increased by 3.8 percent. 
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Turning to measures from the survey of households, the 

unemployment rate was 9.1 percent in September, unchanged over 

the month. Since April, the jobless rate has held in a narrow 

range from 9.0 to 9.2 percent. Of the 14.0 million persons 

unemployed in September, 44.6 percent had been jobless for 27 

weeks or more. 

The labor force participation rate, at 64.2 percent, and 

the employment-population ratio, at 58.3 percent, were little 

changed in September. Among the employed, the number of persons 

working part-time for economic reasons rose by 444,000 to 9.3 

million. 

In summary, nonfarm payroll employment edged up by 103,000 

in September, in part reflecting the return of about 45,000 

telecommunications workers from a strike. The unemployment rate 

held at 9.1 percent and has shown little change since April.