WASHINGTON (June 10, 2013) — Nonfarm payroll employment rose by 175,000 jobs in May 2013, while the unemployment rate remained essentially unchanged at 7.6 percent, according to the latest figures from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.
Professional and business services saw the biggest increase for the month, up 57,000 jobs, the BLS said. Leisure and hospitality (up 38,000 jobs) and retail trade (up 28,000 jobs) also had strong gains, it said.
However, many other areas—including manufacturing, wholesale trade, and transportation and warehousing—saw little change in May.
The U.S. lost 8,000 manufacturing jobs in May and 21,000 in the last three months, said Scott Paul, president of the Alliance for American Manufacturing.
"This is a terrible jobs report for manufacturing," Mr. Paul said. "And it's a direct consequence of our widening trade deficits with Japan and China."
Alan Tonelson, research fellow for the U.S. Business and Industry Council, also said the outlook was gloomy for U.S. manufacturing jobs.
"The new manufacturing job losses…make painfully clear that President Obama's China policies are failing domestic industry and the broader U.S. economy," Mr. Tonelson said. "This new data also show that the president's upcoming summit with Chinese leader Xi Jinping is completely misconceived."
The National Federation of Independent Business said job creation among its members fell slightly in May, after five straight months of job gains.
"Owners are still quite pessimistic about economic recovery, though far less so than six months ago," said NFIB Chief Economist William C. Dunkelberg. "It will take a marked improvement in sales to convince them to hire more workers, and prospects for that are not good."