October 09, 2007 (The Editor’s Desk is updated each business day.)

Unemployment in September 2007

The number of unemployed persons (7.2 million) and the unemployment rate (4.7 percent) were essentially unchanged in September.

Unemployment rate by demographic group, September 2007
[Chart data—TXT]

A year earlier, the number of unemployed persons was 6.9 million and the jobless rate was 4.6 percent.

Over the month, the unemployment rates for adult men (4.2 percent), adult women (4.0 percent), teenagers (16.0 percent), whites (4.2 percent), blacks (8.1 percent) and Hispanics (5.7 percent) showed little or no change.

These data are from the Current Population Survey program and are seasonally adjusted. To learn more, see "The Employment Situation: September 2007" (PDF) (TXT), news release USDL 07-1492.

Happy 10th Birthday, TED!

The very first issue of The Editor's Desk (TED) was posted on September 28, 1998. TED was the first online-only publication of the Bureau of Labor Statistics. For 10 years, BLS has been committed to posting a new TED article each business day, for a total of over 2,400 articles so far.

Find out more about the story of TED