July 2026 Employment Situation — 2026-08-07

Both nonfarm payroll employment (-23,000) and the unemployment rate (4.1 percent) changed little in July, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported today. Employment declined in local government education and retail trade. Employment continued to trend up in health care. This news release presents statistics from two monthly surveys. The household survey measures labor force status, including unemployment, by demographic characteristics. The establishment survey measures nonfarm employment, hours, and earnings by industry. For more information about the concepts and statistical methodology used in these two surveys, see the Technical Note. Both the unemployment rate, at 4.1 percent, and the number of unemployed people, at 6.9 million, changed little in July. These measures also changed little over the year. (See table A-1.) Among the major worker groups, the unemployment rates for teenagers (12.1 percent) and people who are Hispanic (4.6 percent) declined in July.