Commissioner's Statement on the Employment Situation News Release — 2015-04-03

Advance copies of this statement are made available to the press under lock-up conditions with the explicit understanding that the data are embargoed until 8:30 a.m. Eastern Standard Time. Nonfarm payroll employment increased by 126,000 in March, and the unemployment rate was unchanged at 5.5 percent. Employment continued to trend up in professional and business services, health care, and retail trade. Job losses continued in mining. Incorporating the revisions for January and February, which reduced nonfarm employment by 69,000, monthly job gains have averaged 197,000 over the past 3 months. In the 12 months prior to March, employment growth averaged 269,000 per month. Employment in professional and business services continued to trend up in March (+40,000). Job growth in the first quarter of 2015 averaged 34,000 per month in this industry, below the average monthly gain of 59,000 in 2014.