Houston Area Employment — March 2013

Total nonfarm employment in the Houston-Sugar Land-Baytown Metropolitan Statistical Area stood at 2,762,500 in March 2013, up 102,300 from one year earlier, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported today. From March 2012 to March 2013, local nonfarm employment rose 3.8 percent, over two and a half times faster than the national increase of 1.5 percent. Among the 12 largest metropolitan areas in the country, Houston had the fastest rate of job growth. Regional Commissioner Stanley W. Suchman noted that local rates of job growth in all 11 supersectors exceeded their respective national averages. (See chart 1 and table 1; Technical Note at end of release contains metropolitan area definitions. All data in this release are not seasonally adjusted; accordingly, over-the-year analysis is used throughout.)

Industry employment

Trade, transportation, and utilities – Houston’s largest supersector – added the most jobs from March a year ago, up 22,900. Industry gains were broad-based, with wholesalers of durable goods registering the largest increase, up 4,200 over the year. Employment in Houston’s trade, transportation, and utilities sector expanded 4.3 percent from March 2012, nearly three times the national increase of 1.5 percent. (See table 1 and chart 2.)

The education and health services supersector added the second largest number of jobs since March 2012, up 17,800. Growth was particularly strong in the health care component as the ambulatory health care industry added 10,200 jobs, a 7.8-percent rate of growth. Houston’s education and health services sector has posted over-the-year employment gains in every month since February 1991. The local March 2013 annual gain of 5.5 percent far surpassed the national increase of 1.8 percent.

Professional and business services employment rose 13,500 from March 2012; Houston’s 3.4-percent increase compared to a national advance of 3.2 percent. Within the local supersector, annual gains in the architectural, engineering, and related services industry, along with the employment services industry, were especially strong during the period, up 5,100 and 4,700 jobs, respectively.

Houston’s manufacturing supersector grew 4.6 percent, registering its 30th consecutive month of over-the-year gains by adding 10,900 jobs during the year ended in March 2013. In contrast, the national rate of increase in manufacturing was only 0.7 percent. Locally, annual growth was quite strong in the agriculture, construction, and mining machinery manufacturing industry which added 3,900 jobs, an increase of 10.0 percent.

The local leisure and hospitality supersector added 9,700 jobs since March 2012, with food services and drinking places accounting for 90 percent of the increase. The supersector’s 3.8-percent annual growth rate was well above the national advance of 2.3 percent. Still, the latest local annual increase marked a slowdown for the sector compared with recent months; over-the-year increases from June 2012 to February 2013 ranged from 5.6 to 8.7 percent.

Construction added 8,500 jobs. Mining and logging employment increased by 7,200 and the 7.4-percent annual growth rate for this supersector was more than three times the national increase of 2.3 percent. Employment in Houston’s public sector also rose 7,200 over the year. Although the local 1.9-percent increase was among the slowest in the local economy, it compared to a national decrease of 0.3 percent. March 2013 marked the sixth consecutive month of annual gains in the government sector following 19 months of annual declines. Job growth in local educational services accounted for three-fourths of the total government advance in Houston.

Employment in the 12 largest metropolitan areas

Houston was 1 of the nation’s 12 largest metropolitan statistical areas in March 2013. Employment rose over the year in 11 of the 12 areas, with six areas registering growth rates equal to or above the 1.5-percent national advance. Among the 12 areas, Houston experienced the fastest rate of expansion, up 3.8 percent; Detroit-Warren-Livonia was the only area to experience a decline as employment slipped 0.1 percent. (See chart 3 and table 2.)

The Los Angeles-Long Beach-Santa Ana area added the largest number of jobs from the previous March, rising 116,000. New York-Northern New Jersey-Long Island, Houston, and Dallas-Fort Worth-Arlington followed, each with gains of more than 100,000. Philadelphia-Camden-Wilmington registered the smallest 12-month increase, up 12,500, while employment declined 1,200 in Detroit.

Professional and business services registered the largest over-the-year employment gains in 6 of the 12 metropolitan areas–Atlanta-Sandy Springs-Marietta, Boston-Cambridge-Quincy, Dallas, Los Angeles, New York, and San Francisco-Oakland-Fremont. The public sector experienced the largest job losses in five areas–Atlanta, Chicago-Naperville-Joliet, Los Angeles, Miami-Fort Lauderdale-Pompano Beach, and New York; public sector losses were greatest in Los Angeles, down 11,800 over the year.

Additional information

Information in this release will be made available to sensory impaired individuals upon request. Voice phone: 202-691-5200; Federal Relay Service: 1-800-877-8339.

Technical Note

This release presents nonfarm payroll employment estimates from the Current Employment Statistics (CES) program. The CES survey is a Federal-State cooperative endeavor between State employment security agencies and the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

Employment definition. Employment data refer to persons on establishment payrolls who receive pay for any part of the pay period that includes the 12th of the month. Persons are counted at their place of work rather than at their place of residence; those appearing on more than one payroll are counted on each payroll. Industries are classified on the basis of their principal activity in accordance with the 2007 version of the North American Industry Classification System.

Method of estimation. The employment data are estimated using a "link relative" technique in which a ratio (link relative) of current-month employment to that of the previous month is computed from a sample of establishments reporting for both months. The estimates of employment for the current month are obtained by multiplying the estimates for the previous month by these ratios. Small-domain models are used as the official estimators for the approximately 39 percent of CES published series which have insufficient sample for direct sample-based estimates.

Annual revisions. Employment estimates are adjusted annually to a complete count of jobs, called benchmarks, derived principally from tax reports that are submitted by employers who are covered under state unemployment insurance (UI) laws. The benchmark information is used to adjust the monthly estimates between the new benchmark and the preceding one and also to establish the level of employment for the new benchmark month. Thus, the benchmarking process establishes the level of employment, and the sample is used to measure the month-to-month changes in the level for the subsequent months.

Reliability of the estimates. The estimates presented in this release are based on sample surveys, administrative data, and modeling and, thus, are subject to sampling and other types of errors. Sampling error is a measure of sampling variability—that is, variation that occurs by chance because a sample rather than the entire population is surveyed. Survey data also are subject to nonsampling errors, such as those which can be introduced into the data collection and processing operations. Estimates not directly derived from sample surveys are subject to additional errors resulting from the specific estimation processes used. The sums of individual items may not always equal the totals shown in the same tables because of rounding.

Employment estimates. Measures of sampling error are available for state CES data at the total nonfarm and supersector level and for metropolitan area CES data. Information on recent benchmark revisions for states is available on the BLS Web site at www.bls.gov/sae/.

Area definitions. The substate area data published in this release reflect the standards and definitions established by the U.S. Office of Management and Budget on December 1, 2009. A detailed list of geographic definitions is available at www.bls.gov/lau/lausmsa.htm.

The Houston-Sugar Land-Baytown Metropolitan Statistical Area (MSA) includes Austin, Brazoria, Chambers, Fort Bend, Galveston, Harris, Liberty, Montgomery, San Jacinto, and Waller Counties in Texas.

Last Modified Date: April 26, 2013

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