What to Expect From the Labor Department Unemployment Report on Friday

The U.S. Department of Labor will release the Employment Situation report for the month of November this coming Friday morning. This report comes on the heels of a positive ISM manufacturing report but rising weekly jobless claims over the course of the month. Needless to say, this is also one of the most widely followed economic reports each month by investors, traders, economists, business owners and even by politicians.

The ISM Manufacturing Report on Business showed that the Employment Index grew for the 17th consecutive month, registering 54.9% in November, a decrease of 0.6 percentage point below the October reading of 55.5%.

Bloomberg has a consensus estimate for nonfarm payrolls of 230,000 on Friday, the previous reading was 214,000.

Economists expect the unemployment rate to hold consistent with its October reading of 5.8%. In October the largest job growth was in food services, drinking places, retail trade and health care. Employment in the following industries showed little change over the month: logging, mining, wholesale trade, information, financial activities and government.

ADP’s Employment report for November will come out on Wednesday. It has a consensus estimate of 225,000 and the previous reading was 230,000. In the month of October, the ADP report suggested that small businesses added 102,000 jobs, followed by a gain of 122,000 for medium businesses and a gain of 5,000 from large businesses. Service-providing employment rose by 181,000 jobs in October.

TrimTabs will also put out its employment report for November on Wednesday. The previous reading estimated that the U.S. Economy added 314,000 jobs in October. So far TrimTabs data have shown that the economy has created an average of 215,000 jobs per month this year.

The Labor Department said last month that the unemployment rate came in at 5.8%, against a consensus estimate of 5.9% and in line with September’s rate. October’s figure is the lowest unemployment rate since July 2008.

The consensus estimate for private payrolls is 225,000 and the previous reading was 209,000. Average hourly earnings are expected to increase 0.2%, up from 0.1% in the previous month. The average workweek is expected to remain flat at 34.6 hours.

Again, the Employment Situation report is among the most widely followed economic reports of all each and every month.

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