Trucking jobs flat in August; July gain slashed

9:13 employment

The for-hire trucking industry added no new payroll jobs on a net basis in August, and the initial estimate of 6,300 new jobs in July was really just 400 new jobs, according to latest figures from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.

The U.S. economy added 169,000 net new jobs, but as with trucking, the July estimates were revised sharply lower. Instead of adding 162,000 jobs in July, as BLS initially estimated, the economy added 104,000. The unemployment rate dipped a tenth of a point to 7.3% — in large part because more people gave up looking for a job.

The 1.3828 million payroll jobs in for-hire trucking is up by 26,300 jobs, or 1.9%, from August 2012. Trucking employment is up by 148,800, or 12.1%, from the bottom in March 2010, but it remains 70,600 jobs, or 4.9%, below the peak in January 2007.

The BLS numbers for trucking reflect all payroll employment in for-hire trucking, but they don’t include trucking-related jobs in other industries, such as a truck driver for a private fleet. Nor do the numbers reflect the total amount of hiring since they only reflect the number of employees paid during a specified payroll period during the month. Due to high turnover rates, the BLS estimates may overstate the number of job positions due to the methodology used in the agency’s Current Employment Survey.