Quarterly Data Series on Business Employment Dynamics News Release — 2018-11-07

From December 2017 to March 2018, gross job gains from opening and expanding private-sector establishments were 7.4 million, a decrease of 420,000 jobs from the previous quarter, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported today. Over this period, gross job losses from closing and contracting private-sector establishments were 6.7 million, a decrease of 181,000 jobs from the previous quarter. The difference between the number of gross job gains and the number of gross job losses yielded a net employment gain of 740,000 jobs in the private sector during the first quarter of 2018. (See tables A and 1.) The change in the number of jobs over time is the net result of increases and decreases in employment that occur at all private businesses in the economy. Business Employment Dynamics (BED) statistics track these changes in employment at private-sector establishments from the third month of one quarter to the third month of the next.