January 10, 2000 (The Editor’s Desk is updated each business day.)

Job growth in December

Nonfarm payroll employment increased by 315,000 in December to 129.9 million, after seasonal adjustment. Job growth in 1999 totaled 2.7 million or 2.1 percent; this compares to a 2.4 percent gain in 1998.

Change in nonfarm payroll employment, seasonally adjusted, January-December 1999 (thousands)
[Chart data—TXT]

The services industry added 109,000 jobs in December. Employment in retail trade rose by 65,000. Transportation and public utilities added 32,000 jobs in December, twice the average for the prior 12 months. Finance, insurance, and real estate added 12,000 jobs, mostly in finance.

In the goods-producing sector, construction employment rose by 16,000 in December, following a much larger gain in November. In December, for the second straight month, manufacturing employment was little changed.

These data are a product of the BLS Current Employment Statistics program. Find out more in "The Employment Situation: December 1999," news release USDL 00-06. Data for November and December 1999 are preliminary.

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