A summary is below. More details are available on our State Employment Page.

January 22, 2019

Summary

• Missouri added 4,100 jobs and the unemployment rate increased by 0.1 percentage point to 3.1 percent in December according to Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) data.

• Over the past twelve months, Missouri added 39,000 jobs and the unemployment rate fell by 0.6 percentage point from 3.7 percent.

• In December, Missouri's private sector added 3,800 jobs and over the past twelve months, it created 36,800 jobs.

• The number of unemployed Missourians rose by 1,815 in December, and over the past year, 4,328 Missourians found jobs.

• Missouri’s labor force participation rate decreased to 63.6 percent from 63.7 percent in December.  Since last year, the labor force participation rate is unchanged.

• The national unemployment rate rose by 0.2 percentage point to 3.9 percent in December.  State employment and unemployment data for January is scheduled for release on March 11, 2019.  The national employment situation report for January will be released on Friday, February 1, 2019.