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 Standard Time. 

Statement of 

Erica L. Groshen 

Commissioner 

Bureau of Labor Statistics 

Friday, December 4, 2015

Nonfarm payroll employment rose by 211,000 in November, and 

the unemployment rate was unchanged at 5.0 percent. Job gains 

occurred in construction, professional and technical services, 

and health care. Employment declined in mining and information. 

Incorporating revisions for September and October, which 

increased nonfarm payroll employment by 35,000, monthly job 

gains have averaged 218,000 over the past 3 months. In the 12 

months prior to November, employment growth averaged 237,000 per 

month. 

Construction employment rose by 46,000 in November; more 

than half of the gain was among residential specialty trade 

contractors (+26,000). Job growth in construction has picked up 

in recent months. Over the year, construction has added 259,000 

jobs. 
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Employment in professional and technical services rose by 

28,000 in November. Within this industry, accounting and 

bookkeeping services added 11,000 jobs, and employment continued 

to trend up in computer systems design and related services 

(+5,000). 

Health care employment increased by 24,000 over the month, 

following a large gain in October (+51,000). Hospitals added 

13,000 jobs in November. Over the past 12 months, health care 

employment has risen by 470,000. 

Employment in food services and drinking places continued 

to trend up over the month (+32,000). Employment in this 

industry has grown by 374,000 over the year. 

Retail trade employment continued on an upward trend in 

November (+31,000) and has risen by 284,000 over the year. 

November job gains occurred in general merchandise stores 

(+12,000) and motor vehicle and parts dealers (+9,000). Over the 

past 12 months, these two industries have added 85,000 jobs and 

71,000 jobs, respectively. 

Mining employment declined by 11,000 over the month. Since 

a recent peak in December 2014, mining employment has declined 

by 123,000, or 14 percent. Three-fourths of the job losses over 

this period have been in support activities for mining. 

Employment in information was down by 12,000 in November, 

as motion picture and sound recording industries shed 13,000 
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jobs. Employment in motion picture and sound recording 

industries has shown little change on net over the year. 

Average hourly earnings of all employees on private nonfarm 

payrolls rose by 4 cents in November to $25.25, following a 

9-cent increase in October. Over the past 12 months, average 

hourly earnings have risen by 2.3 percent. From October 2014 to 

October 2015, the Consumer Price Index for all Urban Consumers 

(CPI-U) was up by 0.1 percentage point (on a seasonally adjusted 

basis). 

Turning now to data from the survey of households, the 

unemployment rate held at 5.0 percent in November, and the 

number of unemployed, at 7.9 million, was essentially unchanged. 

These measures are down by 0.8 percentage point and 1.1 million, 

respectively, over the year. Among the unemployed in November, 

25.7 percent, or 2.1 million, had been unemployed for 27 weeks 

or more. 

The labor force participation rate, at 62.5 percent, 

changed little in November. The employment-population ratio, at 

59.3 percent, was unchanged over the month and has shown little 

movement since October 2014. 

Among those employed, the number working part time for 

economic reasons, also referred to as involuntary part-time 

workers, rose by 319,000 in November to 6.1 million, following 

declines in September and October. Over the longer term, the 
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number of involuntary part-time workers has been trending down 

since 2011. (Involuntary part-time workers are those who would 

have preferred full-time employment but were working part time 

because their hours had been cut back or because they were 

unable to find full-time work.) 

Among people who were neither working nor looking for work 

in November, 1.7 million were classified as marginally attached 

to the labor force, down from 2.1 million a year earlier. The 

number of discouraged workers, a subset of the marginally 

attached who believed that no jobs were available for them, was 

594,000 in November, little different from a year earlier. (The 

marginally attached are individuals who had not looked for work 

in the 4 weeks prior to the survey but wanted a job, were 

available for work, and had looked for a job within the last 12 

months.) 

In summary, nonfarm payroll employment rose by 211,000 in 

November, and the unemployment rate was unchanged at 5.0 

percent.