U.S. Assistant Secretary of Labor for Public Affairs, Julie McClain Downey issued the following statement on the “April 2023 Employment Situation Report.”
The Bureau of Labor Statistics reported that the American economy added 253,000 jobs in the month of April, and the unemployment rate ticked down to a historic low mark of 3.4 percent – the lowest since May 1969. The last time the unemployment rate was lower was in October 1953.
Average hourly earnings are up 4.4 percent over the year, and production and nonsupervisory employees are seeing average hourly earnings up five percent in that period, which is helping our workers keep pace with increased costs. This month, with steady increases in health care, construction, transportation, and professional and business services jobs, puts Americans on an increasingly solid footing to meet their families’ needs.
Women are making historic contributions to our country’s economic well-being. For prime-age women, the labor force participation rate was 77.5 percent in April, the highest rate since this measurement began in 1948. Additionally, in March, Black unemployment hit an all-time low at 5.0 percent. In April, it reached another: 4.7 percent. Continued focus on eliminating longstanding barriers and creating pathways to enable even more women and people in marginalized communities to fully participate in the economic life of our country will be crucial to sustaining these gains.
The report can be found at: https://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.nr0.htm
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