Union workers in Rhode Island protest a Trump administration stop-work order at an offshore wind farm under construction in August. Friday's jobs report shows the fewest gains in August since 2010. (Photo by Laura Paton/Rhode Island Current)

The United States added only 22,000 jobs in August, and previously reported gains in June were revised down to a loss of 13,000 jobs in a Bureau of Labor Statistics report issued Friday morning.

The August jobs increase was the lowest for that month since 2010 in the aftermath of the Great Recession. June’s decrease was the first jobs loss since a December 2020 COVID-19 surge shuttered restaurants and hotels.

A recent Stateline analysis showed that Virginia and New Jersey may be among the states most affected by recent hiring slowdowns, based on surveys and layoff reports, while California and Texas appeared to continue job gains.

Job openings fell to a 10-month low in July, according to a separate government report issued Sept. 3, and there were more unemployed people than jobs available for the first time since 2021.

Last month’s revisions to the jobs report enraged President Donald Trump when they first appeared Aug. 1. The revisions showed the nation had 258,000 fewer jobs than initially reported in May and June.

In response, Trump declared the numbers were wrong, fired the Bureau of Labor Statistics chief, Erika McEntarfer. He offered as a replacement E.J. Antoni, a loyalist who has proposed suspending the jobs report entirely. Trump falsely said in a Truth Social post at the time that the revised jobs numbers were “RIGGED in order to make the Republicans, and ME, look bad.”

Friday’s report showed August job losses in business and professional services (-17,000), government (-16,000), manufacturing (-12,000), wholesale trade (-11,700) and construction (-7,000), but gains in health care and social assistance (+46,800) and hospitality (+28,000).

The unemployment rate in August ticked up to 4.3%, from 4.2% in July and 4.1% in June. It increased the most for people with less than a high school diploma, up from 5.5% in July to 5.7% in August.

Unemployment ticked up for Black workers (to 7.5% from 7.2%) and Hispanic workers (to 5.3% from 5.0% in July). The rate went down for Asian workers (to 3.6% from 3.9%) and remained the same for white workers at 3.7%.

Editor’s note: This story was updated to add details about changes in industry job numbers and the unemployment rate.

Stateline reporter Tim Henderson can be reached at thenderson@stateline.org.

Mural depicting workers painted on windows of the Madison-Kipp Corp. by Goodman Community Center students and Madison-Kipp employees with Dane Arts Mural Arts. (Photo by Erik Gunn /Wisconsin Examiner)

Wisconsin’s jobs and employment numbers showed a slightly softening economy in July, following national trends, the state labor department reported Thursday.

“The Wisconsin labor market has cooled a bit along with the national economy. Unemployment remains historically low,” said Scott Hodek, section chief in the office of economic advisors for the Wisconsin Department of Workforce Development (DWD), in a briefing on the July numbers.

Private-sector jobs dropped slightly in July from June, DWD reported. Employment and labor force participation edged down slightly, too, as did the state’s unemployment rate.

“What we’re seeing is that Wisconsin seems to be following the national trend,” Hodek told the Wisconsin Examiner. While the economy is cooling down, “we’re actually still seeing historically low unemployment rates,” Hodek said. “So you’ve got kind of a mix of up and down indicators.”

He pointed to national economic uncertainty as well as the longstanding challenge of Wisconsinites aging out of the workforce faster than younger residents are entering it as likely contributors to the economic cooling. 

DWD pegged the number of Wisconsinites working in July at 3.05 million, a drop of 4,500 from June and down 32,500 from July 2024.

The number of people who were unemployed in July was projected at 98,600 — down 2,200 from June, but up 5,400 from July 2024. The unemployment rate for July was 3.1%.

The labor force shrank in July to just under 3.15 million, a decline of 6,700 from June and a decline of 27,000 from July 2024. The labor force is defined as people 16 or older who are working or seeking work, excluding people in the military or who are in institutions such as nursing homes or prisons.

Wisconsin’s labor force participation rate was 65% of the state’s population 16 or older in July — down 0.1% from June and down just under 1% from July a year ago. Labor force participation remains ahead of the U.S. as a whole, while unemployment is lower, DWD reported.

Employment and labor force participation numbers are projected from a monthly survey of households. A separate survey, polling employers, produces data on the number of jobs in the state.

Wisconsin counted just under 3.06 million nonfarm jobs — an increase of 1,800 over June and 20,200 over July a year ago. Private sector jobs in July totaled more than 2.6 million, a decrease of 3,800 from June but still 15,100 ahead of July 2024.

Construction jobs fell by 500 from June, Hodek said, but remained 3,100 ahead of July 2024. Manufacturing jobs fell by 500, and are down 1,800 from a year ago.

Rosier picture in Wisconsin than broader U.S.

Wisconsin’s jobs report Thursday lacked the drama of the national jobs numbers reported two weeks ago that prompted President Donald Trump to fire the nation’s chief statistician.

On Friday, Aug. 1, the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) reported the U.S. gained 73,000 jobs in July, below analysts’ estimates. The BLS also updated national job numbers for May and June, dramatically reducing both: in June, a gain of 14,000 jobs instead of previously reported 147,000, and in May, an increase of 19,000 instead of the previously reported 125,000.

The national unemployment rate of 4.2% was in line with economic forecasts, CNBC reported. Other indicators nationally added up to “a slow but persistent cooling trend,” the North America regional president at Manpower Group, Ger Doyle, told CNBC.

Trump took to his social media platform, Truth Social, to declare without evidence that the numbers were “RIGGED.” He summarily fired the director of the BLS, replacing her this week with an economist from the far-right Heritage Foundation who has called for a broad overhaul of the agency.

Hodek told the Wisconsin Examiner Thursday that DWD has not received any communications about changes in procedure from the BLS.

“We’ve certainly seen the news and we’re monitoring the situation, of course,” Hodek said. “But we do have confidence in our data and we can’t really speculate on what could possibly happen. We’ll just need to wait and see what the Bureau of Labor Statistics actually does down the road.”

Hodek said that revisions of previous months’ reports are “a normal part of the data process.” The first round of data isn’t inaccurate, but “as you take more time, the data become more accurate,” he said.

“Ideally you want a combination of both —  something that kind of gives you the current edge of where you’re headed, and then as more and better data come in, you get a better sense of what has been happening,” Hodek said.

For example, a quarterly collection of information from the unemployment insurance system “actually covers most employers and it’s very solid data,” he said. “But it lags by half a year.”

Information from that report can be used to further refine the calculations and assumptions that go into the state’s monthly reports.

The monthly numbers for the nation as a whole and for each state go through different calculations and formulas, Hodek said, so it’s not possible to draw direct connections between the state jobs numbers and the national jobs numbers.

It’s also too soon to explain the seemingly dramatic differences between the national jobs picture and Wisconsin’s, he added: “We’ve only got a couple of data points where we saw those large revisions, so that doesn’t really make a trend necessarily yet.”

Hodek doesn’t think Wisconsin is somehow “diverging from the national economy,” however, he said. “In fact, it’s fairly unlikely in general, just because what happens to the national economy and the global economy is going to impact us as well. We tend to follow the national and global trends.”

E.J. Antoni of the Heritage Foundation testifies before a U.S. Senate Judiciary subcommittee on Oct. 24, 2023. (Screenshot from C-SPAN)

WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump nominated conservative economist E.J. Antoni to fill the top spot at the Bureau of Labor Statistics after abruptly firing the previous statistician following a disappointing jobs report earlier this month.

Trump announced the nominee late Monday on his Truth Social platform, stating that “Our Economy is booming, and E.J. will ensure that the Numbers released are HONEST and ACCURATE.”

Antoni, an economist at the far-right Heritage Foundation, has harshly criticized the previous BLS commissioner, Erika McEntarfer, who was nominated by former President Joe Biden in 2023 and confirmed by the U.S. Senate 86-6 in January 2024. The bureau tracks national economic data, including employment figures.

Without providing evidence, Trump slammed the latest jobs report, released Aug. 1, as “RIGGED” and fired McEntarfer hours later.

The economy gained just 73,000 jobs in July, according to the monthly report. BLS also significantly adjusted May and June figures, to 33,000 for both months, down from the previously reported 291,000. Revisions to past reports often happen after the bureau receives updated data from businesses and federal agencies.

U.S. economic data collection is often referred to as the “gold standard,” as Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell, a Trump appointee, said last month.

Trump faced backlash for firing McEntarfer, including from his own former BLS commissioner.

William Beach, whom Trump tapped in 2017 to lead BLS, told CNN McEntarfer’s firing was “groundless.”

BLS data is “more accurate now than they were 30 years ago,” Beach said during the Aug. 3 interview.

In an Aug. 4 appearance on Steve Bannon’s WarRoom podcast, Antoni said BLS data collection is “outdated.”

“You need somebody who is willing to overhaul the entire thing,” he told Bannon.

Shortly after Trump’s November win, Antoni posted on X that “DOGE needs to take a chainsaw to BLS.”

Kevin Roberts, Heritage Foundation’s president, said Tuesday that Trump made a “stellar choice” in nominating Antoni.

“EJ Antoni is one of the sharpest economic minds in the nation—a fearless truth-teller who grasps that sound economics must serve the interests of American families, not globalist elites,” Roberts said in a statement. “His leadership as chief economist at The Heritage Foundation has been instrumental in advancing our mission to protect American families and rebuild a resilient economy rooted in free enterprise.”

Antoni contributed to the Heritage Foundation’s Project 2025, a roughly 900-page far-right blueprint to overhaul government institutions published ahead of Trump’s election win.

Antoni will need approval from the Senate, which currently has a 53-47 Republican majority.

Sen. Patty Murray, a senior member and former chair of the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions, slammed Antoni as an “unqualified right-wing extremist who won’t think twice about manipulating BLS data and degrading the credibility of the agency to make Trump happy.”

“Any Senator who votes to confirm this partisan hack is voting to shred the integrity of our nation’s best economic and jobs data, which underpin our entire economy. If E.J. Antoni gets confirmed, I hope Republicans like playing make-believe, because that’s all BLS data will become,” the Washington state Democrat said in a statement Tuesday.

Sen. Bill Cassidy chairs the committee, which will be tasked with advancing Antoni’s nomination to the full Senate. Cassidy, of Louisiana, did not have a statement on Antoni posted on his website or X feed as of Tuesday at 3 p.m. Eastern.

Photo by Architect of the Capitol | U.S. government work via Flickr

The July jobs report released last Friday wasn’t pretty. It showed weaker than anticipated U.S. job growth in July, and there were substantial downward revisions of jobs numbers for May and June as well. Economists predicted a slowdown. The chaos of tariff threats has created substantial uncertainty, which is bad for the economy, and the tariffs that have gone into effect have raised prices. It’s no surprise, then, that we’re seeing a slowdown in jobs. 

Moody’s chief economist Mark Zandi noted on social media, “It’s no mystery why the economy is struggling; blame increasing U.S. tariffs and highly restrictive immigration policy. The tariffs are cutting increasingly deeply into the profits of American companies and the purchasing power of American households. Fewer immigrant workers means a smaller economy.”

But instead of reflecting on mistakes in economic policy or offering some austerity suggestion, like limiting U.S.  children to  two dolls each , President Donald Trump blamed the messenger, firing the government official in charge of the data release, commissioner of the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) Erika McEntarfer. He baselessly asserted that the bad news was “concocted” and suggested that he knows better than the data. The economy is great, according to him, and he will find a commissioner to tell him so.

Trump’s approach is a disaster for economic decision making and for public trust. The BLS is an independent agency with a strong legacy of providing the data that businesses, analysts and policymakers need. Good economic decisions require reliable data. As the American Economics Association wrote: “The BLS has long had a well-deserved reputation for professional excellence and nonpartisan integrity. Safeguarding this tradition is vital for the continued health of the U.S. economy and public trust in our institutions.” 

The BLS monthly jobs report provides a timely snapshot of labor market dynamics which inform investing and hiring decisions as well as policy choices. BLS data also measures the rate of inflation through the consumer price index. The rising price of goods is not only a key economic indicator but also the scale by which Social Security payments are adjusted and a point of reference in private and union wage negotiations.

BLS data are essential to understanding what is going on in the economy, when a slowdown is emerging, and the cost of daily life. The independence and integrity of the agency, long assumed and supported by both parties, is now under attack.

Wisconsinites lived through something like this more than a decade ago. Former Republican Gov. Scott Walker promised to create 250,000 jobs in his first term. He focused on the goal relentlessly, at least until it became clear that he would not meet it. (In fact, the Wisconsin economy didn’t even meet Walker’s first term goal across his two terms – adding just 233,000 jobs by the time he left office after serving for eight years.)

In the first years of Walker’s  “relentless focus on jobs” under his administration’s tagline  “Wisconsin is Open for Business,” the monthly numbers showed that Wisconsin’s economy was growing more slowly than the national labor market and neighboring states. 

Walker blamed the data. He insisted that we wait instead for a federal source which was more reliable, but had a substantial time lag. As someone who watches this data, I can assure that this was the only time in my three-decade career when differences between monthly and quarterly sources of federal jobs data were a policy talking point. 

But in the end, the data issue was just a distraction from the truth. Wisconsin was growing more slowly, and no amount of complaining about the data or waiting for another source on jobs could change that fact. Eventually, the Walker administration went silent on both the data and the promised 250,000 jobs. 

Trump’s approach is worse than waiting for another source of data. His firing of the commissioner suggests that he’ll only accept data that confirms his narrative. And that makes it harder for any of us to trust any data the federal government is willing to release. 

That’s bad for the economy and bad for democracy. As narrow and nerdy as this topic may seem, we all have an interest in facts and reliable data. We have had a government infrastructure capable of producing it. We lose it at our own peril.