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Bureau of Labor Statistics Washington, D.C. 20212
Technical information:Household data: (202) 691-6378 USDL 09-0328http://www.bls.gov/cps/ Establishment data: (202) 691-6555 Transmission of material in this releasehttp://www.bls.gov/ces/ is embargoed until 8:30 A.M. (EDT),Media contact: (202) 691-5902 Friday, April 3, 2009.
THE EMPLOYMENT SITUATION: MARCH 2009
Nonfarm payroll employment continued to decline sharply in March (-663,000), and the unemploy-ment rate rose from 8.1 to 8.5 percent, the Bureau of Labor Statistics of the U.S. Department of Laborreported today. Since the recession began in December 2007, 5.1 million jobs have been lost, with al-most two-thirds (3.3 million) of the decrease occurring in the last 5 months. In March, job losses werelarge and widespread across the major industry sectors.Unemployment (Household Survey Data)In March, the number of unemployed persons increased by 694,000 to 13.2 million, and the unem-ployment rate rose to 8.5 percent. Over the past 12 months, the number of unemployed persons hasgrown by about 5.3 million, and the unemployment rate has risen by 3.4 percentage points. Half of theincrease in both the number of unemployed and the unemployment rate occurred in the last 4 months.(See table A-1.)The unemployment rates continued to trend upward in March for adult men (8.8 percent), adultwomen (7.0 percent), whites (7.9 percent), and Hispanics (11.4 percent). The jobless rates for blacks(13.3 percent) and teenagers (21.7 percent) were little changed over the month. The unemployment ratefor Asians was 6.4 percent in March, not seasonally adjusted, up from 3.6 percent a year earlier. (Seetables A-1, A-2, and A-3.)
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United StatesDepartmentof Labor
Chart 1. Unemployment rate, seasonally adjusted,April 2006 –March 2009
4.04.55.05.56.06.57.07.58.08.59.09.510.0
PercentMillions
Chart 2. Nonfarm payroll employment, seasonally adjusted,April 2006 –March 2009
200920092007200720082008
122.0124.0126.0128.0130.0132.0134.0136.0138.0140.0142.0
20072007 20082008 20092009
 
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Table A. Major indicators of labor market activity, seasonally adjusted
(Numbers in thousands)
HOUSEHOLD DATA
Civilian labor force …………….…………154,648153,993153,716154,214154,048-166Employment …………………….………144,046141,578142,099141,748140,887-861Unemployment ……………….…………10,60212,41511,61612,46713,161694Not in labor force ………………….………80,17780,92081,02380,69981,038339All workers ……………….……………....6.98.17.68.18.50.4Adult men …………………....……...……6.88.27.68.18.8.7Adult women ………….…………………5.66.76.26.77.0.3Teenagers ………….………………...…20.721.320.821.621.7.1White ……….………….…...……………6.37.46.97.37.9.6Black or African American
 
………….…11.513.112.613.413.3-.1Hispanic or Latino ethnicity ………..……8.910.79.710.911.4.5
ESTABLISHMENT DATA
Nonfarm employment ……….……...………135,727p 133,678 134,333p 133,682p 133,019p -663Goods-producing
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…...…...………………20,803p 19,835 20,127p 19,842p 19,537p -305Construction ..…...…………….………6,949p 6,593 6,706p 6,599p 6,473p -126Manufacturing …………………....……13,062p 12,474 12,640p 12,471p 12,310p -161Service-providing
1
………...……..……114,924p 113,843 114,206p 113,840p 113,482p -358Retail trade
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…...…………….…..…15,127p 14,942 14,992p 14,941p 14,893p -48Professional and business service ….....17,485p 17,042 17,205p 17,027p 16,894p -133Education and health services …..…….19,035p 19,136 19,119p 19,141p 19,149p 8Leisure and hospitality …...…………….13,348p 13,236 13,268p 13,240p 13,200p -40Government ………...…………………22,538p 22,540 22,540p 22,543p 22,538p -5Total private ……...…………...……………33.4p 33.3 33.3p 33.3p 33.2p -0.1Manufacturing …………….……...………40.2p 39.5 39.8p 39.5p 39.3p -.2Overtime ……...………………..…….3.2p 2.8 2.9p 2.7p 2.7p .0Total private ……...………………….……104.1p 101.8 102.5p 101.9p 100.9p -1.0Average hourly earnings, total private …...…$18.34p $18.47 $18.43p $18.47p $18.50p $0.03Average weekly earnings, total private …….612.55p 614.32 613.72p 615.05p 614.20p -.85Earnings
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EmploymentLabor force statusUnemployment ratesp = preliminary.Feb.-Mar.changeHours of work 
31
Includes other industries, not shown separately.
2
Quarterly averages and the over-the-month change are calculated using unrounded data.
3
Data relate to private production and nonsupervisory workers.CategoryQuarterly averagesMonthly dataIndexes of aggregate weekly hours (2002=100)
3
Mar. 2009IV 2008I 2009Jan. 2009Feb. 2009
 
 
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Among the unemployed, the number of job losers and persons who completed temporary jobsincreased by 547,000 to 8.2 million in March. This group has nearly doubled in size over the past 12months. (See table A-8.)The number of long-term unemployed (those jobless for 27 weeks or more) rose to 3.2 million overthe month and has increased by about 1.9 million since the start of the recession in December 2007.(See table A-9.)Total Employment and the Labor Force (Household Survey Data)The civilian labor force participation rate (65.5 percent) was little changed in March. The employ-ment-population ratio fell by 0.4 percentage point to 59.9 percent. The employment-population ratio foradult men was 68.2 percent in March, down 4.3 percentage points since December 2007. The employ-ment-population ratio for adult women was 56.8 percent, down 1.3 percentage points since the begin-ning of the recession. (See table A-1.)In March, the number of persons working part time for economic reasons (sometimes referred to asinvoluntary part-time workers) climbed by 423,000 to 9.0 million. (See table A-5.)Persons Not in the Labor Force (Household Survey Data)About 2.1 million persons (not seasonally adjusted) were marginally attached to the labor force inMarch, 754,000 more than a year earlier. These individuals wanted and were available for work and hadlooked for a job sometime in the prior 12 months. They were not counted as unemployed because theyhad not searched for work in the 4 weeks preceding the survey. Among the marginally attached, therewere 685,000 discouraged workers in March, up by 284,000 from a year earlier. Discouraged workersare persons not currently looking for work because they believe no jobs are available for them. Theother 1.4 million persons marginally attached to the labor force in March had not searched for work inthe 4 weeks preceding the survey for reasons such as school attendance or family responsibilities. (Seetable A-13.)Industry Payroll Employment (Establishment Survey Data)Total nonfarm payroll employment continued to fall sharply (-663,000) in March. Payroll em-ployment has declined by 3.3 million in the past 5 months. In March, job losses were large andextended across nearly all major industry sectors. (See table B-1.)Manufacturing employment fell by 161,000 in March, with widespread job losses occurring amongthe component industries. Factory employment has declined by 1.0 million over the past 6 months. InMarch, the largest decreases occurred in fabricated metal products (-28,000), machinery (-27,000), andtransportation equipment (-26,000).The construction industry lost 126,000 jobs in March, with declines occurring throughout theindustry. Employment in construction has fallen by 1.3 million since peaking in January 2007; nearlyhalf of that decline occurred over the last 5 months. In March, employment fell in specialty tradecontractors (-83,000) and construction of buildings (-33,000). These declines were split about evenlybetween the residential and nonresidential portions of these industries. Heavy and civil engineeringconstruction also lost 10,000 jobs. Employment in mining and logging declined by 18,000 in March.
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