Trucking adds 2,500 jobs in November

For-hire trucking companies added 2,500 payroll jobs in November on a seasonally adjusted basis after a downward revision by 1,600 jobs of initial October trucking employment figures, according to the latest estimates released Dec. 7 by the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

The overall U.S. economy added 146,000 nonfarm jobs in November, but that followed a downward revision of October levels by 49,000. The national unemployment rate in November was 7.7% — down from 7.9% in October, according to BLS figures. BLS said its analysis suggests that Hurricane Sandy did not substantively impact the national employment and unemployment estimates for November.

Payroll employment in trucking in November totaled 1.3584 million jobs — up 0.18% from October and 3.6% from November 2011. Trucking employment is up by 124,200 jobs, or 10.1%, from the bottom in March 2010, but it remains 95,000 jobs, or 6.5%, below the peak in January 2007. The number of trucking jobs is up 3.1% since the beginning of the year.

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.