November 25, 2008 (The Editor’s Desk is updated each business day.)

Quarterly job gains and losses, March 2008

Opening and expanding private sector business establishments gained 7.1 million jobs in the first quarter of 2008, a decrease of 546,000 from the previous quarter. Over the quarter, expanding establishments added 5.7 million jobs while opening establishments added 1.4 million jobs.

Three-month private sector gross job gains and losses, March 2006-March 2008
[Chart data—TXT]

Gross job losses totaled 7.4 million in the first quarter of 2008, an increase of 34,000 from the previous quarter. During the quarter, contracting establishments lost 6.0 million jobs, while closing establishments lost 1.4 million jobs.

The difference between the number of gross jobs gained and the number of gross jobs lost yielded a net change of -270,000 jobs in the private sector for first quarter 2008. This is the second time in the past three quarters that there has been a net job loss.

These data are from the Business Employment Dynamics program. For more information, see "Business Employment Dynamics: First Quarter 2008," (PDF) (HTML) news release 08-1715.