Employment
Employment is perhaps the most commonly used measure of the economy because of its simplicity and timely availability. However, jobs are highly unequal because of wide differences in hourly wages and in the number of hours worked. Thus, indicators measured in dollars, such as earnings or gross product, provide a much better indication of the size and growth of an economy than does employment.
Several measures of employment are available. Most exclude some wage and salary workers as well as all proprietors. The U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) is the only source of total employment, including estimates of the number of proprietors as well as the total number of wage and salary workers. Annual estimates are available back to 1969. The annual percent change in total employment, starting in 1970, for the United States, Arizona, and the 15 Arizona counties is presented on Arizona Indicators.
Monthly employment estimates are produced by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), derived from the monthly Current Employment Statistics survey. The data are limited to nonfarm wage and salary employment. Using monthly data, the year-over-year percent changes in employment for Arizona and the United States are displayed on Arizona Indicators for the last five-to-six years. The seasonally adjusted number employed in Arizona also is presented.
Annual data are from the U. S. Department of Commerce, Bureau of Economic Analysis. State and national data are reported nine months after the end of a year. The data can be accessed from http://www.bea.gov/regional/spi/; total employment is included in tables SA04 and SA25. County data are released 16 months after the end of a year, accessible at http://www.bea.gov/regional/reis/; total employment is included in tables CA04 and CA25.
Monthly data are from the U.S. Department of Labor, Bureau of Labor Statistics. National data are released a few days after the end of each month: http://www.bls.gov/ces/. State and county data come out around the 20th of each month: http://www.bls.gov/sae/. Produced in cooperation with the Arizona Department of Commerce, the state and county data also are available at http://www.workforce.az.gov/cgi/dataanalysis/AreaSelection.asp?tableName=Ces.
The annual employment figures are estimates. Though most jobs are counted in the Quarterly Census of Employment and Wages (QCEW), which is released about six months after the end of each quarter, proprietors and some wage and salary workers are not counted in the census. No distinction is made between full-time and part-time employment.
The monthly data, which are limited to nonfarm wage and salary jobs, are derived from a survey and are subject to substantial revision. The first revision occurs with the release of the following month’s data. Benchmark revisions to monthly data for each of the two prior years are released around the end of February, based on QCEW data. No distinction is made between full-time and part-time employment. While seasonally adjusted data are provided on Arizona Indicators, significant monthly fluctuations in the unadjusted data preclude the calculation of the month-to-month change. Instead, the emphasis is on comparing one month’s data to the figures for the same month in the prior year.
Employment, Year-Over-Year Percent Change
Visualization Notes:
The annual percent change in employment typically is considerably higher in Arizona than the national average, as in 2005 and 2006. Year-over-year wage and salary employment growth peaked in early 2006 at more than 6 percent in Arizona and barely more than 2 percent nationally. After that, the growth rate fell much more in Arizona than nationally. Employment was lower than one year earlier from December 2007 through December 2010 in Arizona and from February 2008 through August 2010 nationally. The year-over-year percent change in employment was lower in Arizona than the national average from December 2007 through July 2011. Though employment growth in Arizona surged ahead of the national average in August and September, monthly figures are erratic and subject to revision. Estimates for most of 2010 and all of 2011 remain subject to revision.
Employment in Arizona, Seasonally Adjusted
Visualization Notes:
Following substantial employment increases through early 2007, seasonally adjusted wage and salary employment was flat through the rest of 2007 in Arizona. A precipitous decline occurred from the end of 2007 through 2009, with the lowest figure of the economic cycle not occurring until September 2010 at 324,000 (12.1 percent) below the prerecession peak. Since then, employment in Arizona has increased at a modest pace, with a net gain of 57,700. However, employment in September 2011 remained 9.9 percent (266,300) lower than the peak of the prior economic cycle.
Employment, Percent Change, 2009
Visualization Notes:
The most recent data for total employment by county are for 2009, a recessionary year. In every Arizona county, employment decreased. In 12 of the 15 counties, the decrease was larger than the national average.
* The percent change in Greenlee County was -30.5%
Employment, Percent Change
Visualization Notes:
On average, employment growth needs to be as fast as population growth to keep the unemployment rate from rising. Employment gains are highly cyclical; employment growth typically exceeds population growth during economic expansions, but the percent change typically is less than that of population during recessions. In Arizona, the percent change in employment during economic expansions has dropped over time, a natural result of the considerable increase in the size of the Arizona economy.
Employment growth in Arizona typically is much greater than the national average, though the differential is much less during recessions. Until 2008, employment in Arizona had not decreased since 1975. In 2008, 2009, and 2010, employment dropped in Arizona, with the percentage decrease worse than the national average in each year. In only two of the prior 38 years was the percentage change less in Arizona than the U.S. average.
Data Source
Annual data are from the U. S. Department of Commerce, Bureau of Economic Analysis. State and national data are reported nine months after the end of a year. The data can be accessed from http://www.bea.gov/regional/spi/; total employment is included in tables SA04 and SA25. County data are released 16 months after the end of a year, accessible at http://www.bea.gov/regional/reis/; total employment is included in tables CA04 and CA25.
Monthly data are from the U.S. Department of Labor, Bureau of Labor Statistics. National data are released a few days after the end of each month: http://www.bls.gov/ces/. State and county data come out around the 20th of each month: http://www.bls.gov/sae/. Produced in cooperation with the Arizona Department of Commerce, the state and county data also are available at http://www.workforce.az.gov/cgi/dataanalysis/AreaSelection.asp?tableName=Ces.
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