by Calculated Risk on 2/07/2020 08:53:00 AM

From the BLS:

Total nonfarm payroll employment rose by 225,000 in January, and the unemployment rate was little changed at 3.6 percent, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported today. Notable job gains occurred in construction, in health care, and in transportation and warehousing.
...
The change in total nonfarm payroll employment for November was revised up by 5,000 from +256,000 to +261,000, and the change for December was revised up by 2,000 from +145,000 to +147,000. With these revisions, employment gains in November and December combined were 7,000 higher than previously reported.
...
In January, average hourly earnings for all employees on private nonfarm payrolls rose by 7 cents to $28.44. Over the past 12 months, average hourly earnings have increased by 3.1 percent.
emphasis added

Click on graph for larger image.

The first graph shows the monthly change in payroll jobs, ex-Census (meaning the impact of the decennial Census temporary hires and layoffs is removed - mostly in 2010 - to show the underlying payroll changes).

Total payrolls increased by 225 thousand in December (private payrolls increased 206 thousand).

Payrolls for November and December were revised up 7 thousand combined.

This graph shows the year-over-year change in total non-farm employment since 1968.

In January, the year-over-year change was 2.052 million jobs.

The third graph shows the employment population ratio and the participation rate.

The Labor Force Participation Rate was increased in January at 63.4%. This is the percentage of the working age population in the labor force.   A large portion of the recent decline in the participation rate is due to demographics and long term trends.

The Employment-Population ratio was increased to 61.2% (black line).

I'll post the 25 to 54 age group employment-population ratio graph later.

The fourth graph shows the unemployment rate.

The unemployment rate was increased in January to 3.6%.

This was above consensus expectations of 161,000 jobs added, and November and December were revised up by 7,000 combined.

On the annual benchmark revision:

The total nonfarm employment level for March 2019 was revised downward by 514,000 (-505,000 on a not seasonally adjusted basis), or -0.3 percent. The absolute average benchmark revision over the past 10 years is 0.2 percent.

The over-the-year change in total nonfarm employment for 2019 was revised from +2,108,000 to +2,096,000 (seasonally adjusted).

I'll have much more later ...