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A tale of 2 US employment surveys, at a glance

Friday - 4/4/2014, 6:29pm  ET

The Associated Press

The U.S. economy added 192,000 jobs in March, a respectable gain that would typically be enough to lower the unemployment rate. Yet the rate was unchanged at 6.7 percent.

Why did the unemployment rate remain the same if the job gain was solid?


One is called the payroll survey. It asks mostly large companies and government agencies how many people they employed during the month. This survey produces the number of jobs gained or lost. For March, the payroll survey showed that companies and government agencies added 192,000 jobs.


In March, the household survey showed that 503,000 more Americans began looking for work. About 476,000 quickly found jobs. But the remaining 27,000 joined the ranks of the unemployed.

An increase in unemployed people usually lifts the unemployment rate. But in this case, the increase wasn't large enough to do so. That's why the rate remained the same.





Still, they note that the two surveys tend to even out over time. Over the past year, the payroll survey shows that companies have added 2.25 million jobs. The household survey has found that 2.35 million more Americans said they had jobs.
