Total nonfarm payroll employment increased by 315,000 in August, and the unemployment rate rose to 3.7 percent, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported today. Notable job gains occurred in professional and business services, health care, and retail trade.

This is the smallest job gain since April of 2021, compared to a downwardly revised 526K in July. Still, figures beat market forecasts of 300K and pointed to broad-based hiring across many sectors.

Nonfarm employment has risen by 5.8 million over the past 12 months, as the labor market continued to recover from the job losses of the pandemic-induced recession. This growth brings total nonfarm employment 240,000 higher than its pre-pandemic level in February 2020.

In August, notable job gains occurred in professional and business services, health care, and retail trade.

Professional and business services added 68,000 jobs in August. Within the industry, employment gains occurred in computer systems design and related services (+14,000), management and technical consulting services (+13,000), architectural and engineering services (+10,000), and scientific research and development services (+6,000), while legal services lost jobs (-9,000).

Over the past 12 months, professional and business services has added 1.1 million jobs.

In August, health care employment rose by 48,000, with job gains in offices of physicians (+15,000), hospitals (+15,000), and nursing and residential care facilities (+12,000).

Health care has added 412,000 jobs over the year. Despite this growth, employment in health care is below its February 2020 level by 37,000, or 0.2 percent.

In August, the unemployment rate rose by 0.2 percentage point to 3.7 percent, and the number of unemployed persons increased by 344,000 to 6.0 million. In July, these measures had returned to their levels in February 2020, prior to the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic.