Total nonfarm payroll employment increased by 236,000 in February, and the unemployment rate edged down to 7.7 percent, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported today. Employment increased in professional and business services, construction, and health care.
The unemployment rate edged down to 7.7 percent in February but has shown little movement, on net, since September 2012. The number of unemployed persons, at 12.0 million, also edged lower in February.
In February, the number of long-term unemployed (those jobless for 27 weeks or more) was about unchanged at 4.8 million. These individuals accounted for 40.2 percent of the unemployed.
The number of persons employed part time for economic reasons, at 8.0 million, was essentially unchanged in February. These individuals were working part time because their hours had been cut back or because they were unable to find a full-time job.
In February, 2.6 million persons were marginally attached to the labor force, the same as a year earlier. (The data are not seasonally adjusted.) These individuals were not in the labor force, wanted and were available for work, and had looked for a job sometime in the prior 12 months. They were not counted as unemployed because they had not searched for work in the 4 weeks preceding the survey.
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