Commissioner's Statement on the Employment Situation News Release — 2020-05-11

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 Daylight Time. (NOTE: On May 11, 2020, BLS corrected errors in national estimates for seasonally adjusted all employees in professional and technical services, professional and business services, private service- providing, service-providing, total private, and total nonfarm. The corrected change in total nonfarm employment for April is 37,000 lower than initially reported. Estimates in the LABSTAT database and in this statement were corrected for February, March, and April 2020. BLS also corrected other supporting documentation on www.bls.gov/ces/.) Nonfarm payroll employment declined by 20.5 million in April, and the unemployment rate increased to 14.7 percent, reflecting the widespread impact on the job market of the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic and efforts to contain it. Employment fell sharply in all major industry sectors, with a particularly large decline in the leisure and hospitality sector.