September Jobs Report: Payrolls Up 119K, Jobless Total Rises to 7.6 Million

Source: ETHNews Original Title: September Jobs Report: Payrolls Up 119K, Jobless Total Rises to 7.6 Million Original Link: https://www.ethnews.com/september-jobs-report-payrolls-up-119k-jobless-total-rises-to-7-6-million/ More than six weeks after the federal shutdown froze government operations, the long-awaited September 2025 U.S. jobs report has finally been published, and it points to a labor market that is growing, but barely.

Hiring Remains Weak as Unemployment Holds Higher Than Last Year

Employers added 119,000 jobs in September, a gain that underscores how hiring has cooled since spring. The unemployment rate stayed at 4.4%, leaving roughly 7.6 million people out of work, noticeably more than the 6.9 million jobless a year earlier.

Both the labor-force participation rate (62.4%) and the employment-population ratio (59.7%) showed virtually no movement, echoing a year of stalled progress in labor engagement.

Long-term unemployment, Americans searching for work for 27 weeks or longer, remained stubborn at 1.8 million, representing nearly a quarter of all unemployed workers.

Where Jobs Increased and Where They Disappeared

A handful of service-based industries continued to expand:

• Health care
• Food services
• Social assistance

Meanwhile, weakness showed up in sectors tied to logistics and public operations. Transportation and warehousing shed jobs, signaling softer goods movement, and federal employment declined amid government uncertainty.

Millions of Americans are still stuck in unstable work patterns. About 4.6 million people are employed part time involuntarily, unable to secure full-time roles. Another 5.9 million say they want a job but aren’t officially counted as unemployed because they didn’t search recently.

What the Shutdown Did to the Data

The September release is unusual because of how it was assembled:

• All household survey data was collected before the shutdown began.
• Establishment survey data mixes pre-shutdown responses with figures businesses submitted electronically while agencies were closed.
• The response rate for businesses came in at 80.2%, higher than normal because of that self-reporting.

The shutdown also means BLS will skip the October report entirely. October’s establishment figures will be bundled with November numbers, while the household survey for October was never conducted and will not be recreated. The next full report is scheduled for December 16, 2025.

A Cooling Market Heading Into Year-End

Taken together, the September figures show a U.S. job market that has not collapsed but is clearly losing momentum. Hiring has been flat for months, unemployment is edging higher compared to last year, and participation remains stuck at low levels.

With two months of disrupted data ahead, policymakers and markets will be watching the combined October-November release for a clearer signal on whether the labor slowdown is stabilizing, or deepening.