Despite Lower National Jobs Revision, New York Still Growing

August has been a month to forget for the nation’s economic outlook. In addition to rising trade tensions with China, the Bureau of Labor Statistics recently released revisions on job data over a 12-month span that paints a less-rosy picture of the continued expansion.

The newly revised figures detail that job estimates were off by 20% in the period between April 2018 and March 2019. A total of 500,000 jobs were stricken from the record, along with an adjustment on gross domestic product, which was lowered from 3% to 2.5%.

Despite the less-than-stellar revisions, July jobs data shows that New York City's economy is still going strong. The addition of nearly 84,000 private sector jobs over the past year has led to an annual growth rate of 2.1%, which remains ahead of the nation’s 1.7%.

Of the nine employment sectors, seven have witnessed positive job growth in the past year. The largest gains remain in the health and services sector, which added 40,000 jobs. The professional and business services sector added more than 15,000 jobs, while the trade, transportation and utilities sector added approximately 11,000 jobs. While it is still promising to see the information sector add jobs, with more than 5,000 in the past year, the city continues to see losses in banking as the financial services sector recorded a loss of 1,600 jobs.

Other bright spots include an unemployment rate, currently at 4.3%, that has been unchanged all summer and remains near all-time lows. The office of the New York City comptroller has reported that the city’s economy grew 3.4% in the second quarter, up from the 3.1% registered in the first quarter. Driving this growth is the strong year-over-year rise in average hourly earnings, which rose 4.4% in the second quarter — a notable increase compared to the 3.2% growth recorded nationwide over the same span.