April Employment Report: 253 thousand Jobs, 3.4% Unemployment Rate

From the BLS:

Total nonfarm payroll employment rose by 253,000 in April, and the unemployment rate changed little at 3.4 percent, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported today. Employment continued to trend up in professional and business services, health care, leisure and hospitality, and social assistance.
...
The change in total nonfarm payroll employment for February was revised down by 78,000, from +326,000 to +248,000, and the change for March was revised down by 71,000, from +236,000 to +165,000. With these revisions, employment in February and March combined is 149,000 lower than previously reported.
emphasis added

Click on graph for larger image.

The first graph shows the jobs added per month since January 2021.

Total payrolls increased by 253 thousand in April.  Private payrolls increased by 230 thousand, and public payrolls increased 23 thousand.

Payrolls for February and January were revised down 149 thousand, combined.

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

In April, the year-over-year change was 4.00 million jobs.  Employment was up significantly year-over-year.

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

The Labor Force Participation Rate was unchanged at 62.6% in April, from 62.6% in March. This is the percentage of the working age population in the labor force.

The Employment-Population ratio was unchanged at 60.4% from 60.4% (blue 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 decreased in April to 3.4% from 3.5% in March.

This was above consensus expectations; however, February and March payrolls were revised down by 149,000 combined.  

I'll have more later ...