December Employment and Unemployment: The Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) released a report today on employment and unemployment for December (pdf summary). Highlights of the report:

Unemployment Rate

• The unemployment rate dropped to 9.4% in December, from a rate of 9.8% in November.  December marks a record 20^th consecutive month (since data officially began in 1948) that the unemployment rate has been over 9.0%.
• The number of long-term unemployed (those unemployed for 27 weeks or longer) continued to edge up slightly in December to a level of 6.4 million persons, representing 44.3% of the unemployed. 
• There were 14.5 million unemployed persons in December, down from 15.1 million in November.

Payroll Employment

• Total non-farm payroll employment rose by 103,000 in December, following a gain of 71,000 in November (revised upwards from 39,000) and a gain of 210,000 in October (revised upwards from 172,000).  
  • The largest employment gains came from: leisure and hospitality (+47,000); healthcare (+36,000); and temporary help services (+16,000).
  • The average workweek held steady at 34.3 hours for all private nonfarm employees. 
  • Employment has fallen by 7.2 million since the start of the recession in December, 2007.