according to federal data<\/a> released Friday by Governor Maura Healey\u2019s administration. It was the biggest two-month hiring spurt since January and February of 2022, and mirrored a pickup across the country.<\/p>\nThe local unemployment rate was unchanged at 4.7 percent in April compared with a US rate of 4.3 percent. The state\u2019s labor force \u2014 the number of people with a job or actively looking for one \u2014 continued a decline that began early last year. A shrinking labor force, if sustained, could constrain the state\u2019s economy.<\/p>\n
\u201cJob postings activity remains strong across sectors, with encouraging signals that the Commonwealth\u2019s high-tech industries are seeking more workers as well,\u201d Mark Rembert, chief economist at the state\u2019s economic research department, said in a statement.<\/p>\n
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Monthly employment data are prone to swings, especially at the state level, so looking at longer time periods can offer a more useful picture of the job market. Over the past six months, Massachusetts added 15,300 jobs. That compares with a loss of nearly 14,000 positions in the prior six months, leaving the state with a modest employment uptick over the past year.<\/p>\n
Job gains in April were led by construction, education and health services, and professional and business services. The financial activities and information sectors saw small declines.<\/p>\n
Monthly payroll numbers are derived from a survey of employers by the US Bureau of Labor Statistics. A separate BLS survey of households showed that the ranks of the employed in the state fell by more than 44,000 since the start of the year.<\/p>\n
The decline was driven by residents dropping out of the labor force, largely due to retirements. However, the Trump administration\u2019s strict immigration limits and deportations are also a likely contributing factor in the smaller pool of available workers.<\/p>\n
The state\u2019s labor force participation rate decreased slightly to 65.6 percent last month. But among prime-age workers who are 25 to 54 years old, the group economists watch most closely, the participation rate hit 86.7 percent, the highest in a decade.<\/p>\n
Larry Edelman can be reached at larry.edelman@globe.com<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Massachusetts employers hired at a rapid clip for the second straight month in April, recording the best back-to-back…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":659840,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[36],"tags":[28,101],"class_list":["post-659839","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-economy","tag-business","tag-economy"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/659839","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=659839"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/659839\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/659840"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=659839"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=659839"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=659839"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}