SOUTHAMPTON, N.Y. — The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics' November jobs report was a mixed bag of positive and negative news. The unemployment rate continued to approach pre-pandemic levels, but the number of new jobs reported was lower than expected.
Another 210,000 jobs were added to the economy in November, which was below the expectations of many economists. However, the monthly jobs figures have been revised upwards several times this year as the data is updated. The BLS revised its September and October jobs data up a total of 82,000 jobs.
Meanwhile, the national unemployment rate fell from 4.6 percent to 4.2 percent from October to November, according to the BLS. The unemployment rate before the pandemic was 3.5%.
The most recent local unemployment figures available are for October. this rate has improved since September in the Southampton area and remains lower than it was at the start of the pandemic.
Suffolk County's unemployment rate was 4 percent in October, up from 4.2 percent in September. This reflected some improvement from October 2020, when the unemployment rate stood at 5.8%.
Suffolk County's October unemployment rate was also lower than New York's rate of 6 percent, according to the latest data from the BLS.
Nationally, the labor force participation rate — a measure of the employed share of the civilian population — rose 0.2 percentage points to 61.8 percent. The increase was welcome news to economists, but the participation rate is still 1.5 percentage points below pre-pandemic levels.
