U.S. payrolls rise by 165,000 as earlier jobs gains improve

U.S. nonfarm payroll employment rose by an estimated 165,000 in October 2026, while the unemployment rate changed little at 4.1%, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported November 6.

The payroll estimate counts jobs, not the number of people newly hired. The unemployment rate comes from a separate household survey and measures unemployed people as a share of the labor force.

BLS raised its estimate of August’s payroll gain from 133,000 to 186,000 and September’s from 29,000 to 60,000. Those revisions add a combined 84,000 to the earlier estimates for those months; they are separate from October’s gain. BLS attributes revisions to additional business and government reports and recalculated seasonal factors.

Professional and business services added 70,000 jobs in October and health care added 42,000. Average hourly earnings for all employees on private nonfarm payrolls rose 14 cents, or 0.4%, to $38.00; that nominal average was up 3.1% over the 12 months through October.

The household survey estimated 7.1 million unemployed people. Of those, 2.0 million had been jobless for at least 27 weeks, accounting for 27.6% of the unemployed. The same survey counted 4.8 million people working part time for economic reasons, up 339,000; they were employed but wanted full-time work and had reduced hours or could not find it.

KPMG chief economist Diane Swonk welcomed the payroll gains in a PBS NewsHour interview, saying “we're generating a lot more paychecks, which is great.” Seema Shah, chief global strategist at Principal Asset Management, said the report rebutted fears of a meaningful slowdown in an email reported by CBS News.

BLS schedules its November employment report for December 4 at 8:30 a.m. Eastern time.