- Unemployment rate down to 4.2%–matching the nation for the first time in nearly 4 years.
- Gain of 14,900 jobs reverses much of the June-July plunge, though the sectoral performance was mixed.
New Jersey’s labor market conditions look substantially better with the release of the September numbers. The state’s unemployment rate fell from 4.3% to 4.2%, which was the ninth straight drop. Moreover, New Jersey’s unemployment rate in September matches the nation’s. Our rate had been higher than the national figure in every month since November 2022 (New Jersey’s rate was lower than the nation’s in October 2022).
In recent months New Jersey’s unemployment rate decline has resulted from marked gains in employment of state residents outstripping increases in the labor force—a combination generally regarded as quite positive. September saw employment growing 13,930, and the labor force increasing by 10,286.
For the first time in some months the state’s job picture brightened. September saw a strong 14,900 increase in payroll employment, along with a 2,900 upward revision in the estimate for August (August is now reported to have seen a modest job gain, rather than a modest loss). These gains reverse much, though not all, of the large 26,100 June-July job losses. Not all the job news in September was good, though: Trade, Transportation, and Utilities shed 5,100 positions, and Information employment fell by 1,100. Government jobs were also down (though that decline could have been an artifact of problems with seasonal adjustment. As always, with the start of the school year, the headcount of government workers rose markedly in September). The large increases were in Education and Health and in Leisure and Hospitality.
With the September rebound, it appears that the marked drop in the job count earlier in the summer may have been largely a reflection of technical statistical issues such as the difficulty of pinning down seasonal movements in employment, rather than a fundamental weakening in New Jersey’s economy relative to the nation or the region. In that regard, New Jersey’s September numbers were somewhat better than New York’s. New York’s payroll gain of 19,600 looks quite comparable to New Jersey’s, though a bit lower in percentage terms. However, about 2/3 of New York’s increase was in the government sector (likely reflecting imperfections in seasonal adjustment of the numbers), and New York’s unemployment rate was an unchanged 4.3%.
