David Y. Ige | DBEDT press release: UNEMPLOYMENT RATE IN HAWAII AT 6.0 PERCENT IN NOVEMBER

HONOLULU – The Hawaii State Department of Business, Economic Development & Tourism (DBEDT) announced today that the seasonally adjusted unemployment rate was 6.0 percent in November, compared to the revised 6.4 percent in October. Nationwide, 608,000 were employed and 38,450 unemployed in November, which corresponds to a seasonally adjusted total labor force of 646,450. At the national level, the seasonally adjusted unemployment rate was 4.2 percent in November, compared with 4.6 percent in October.

The unemployment rate for the state of Hawaii and the United States in this news release are seasonally adjusted using the US Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) methodology.

The non-seasonally adjusted rate for the state was 5.4 percent in November, compared with the revised rate of 5.9 percent in October.

Employment in payroll in the industry (company survey)

In another employment measure, total non-farm employment increased by 600 over the month. There was growth in the leisure and hospitality industry (+1,200); Education and health services (+300); Professional and business services (+200); and manufacturing (+100). Accommodation accounted for the majority of the increase in Leisure & Hospitality. Employment in the retail, transport and utilities sectors remained unchanged. Job losses were recorded in the information sector (-100); Construction (-300); Financial activities (-300); and other services (-400). Government employment fell by 100 jobs. Over the course of the year (November 2020 was the 8th month of the pandemic effects), jobs outside of agriculture rose by 44,800, or 8.4 percent. However, compared to March 2020 (last month before the pandemic effects), non-farm jobs fell by 77,700, or -11.9 percent.

Workforce Components

The concepts and definitions used by the Local Unemployment Statistics (LAUS) program are the same as those used in the current population survey for the national labor force data:

• Civilian Workers. All persons from the civil non-institutional population aged 16 and over who are classified as either employed or unemployed are included. (See the definitions below.)
• Employed. These are all persons who in the reference week (the week with the 12th day of the month) (a) exercised gainful employment, worked in their own business or profession or on their own farm, or worked 15 hours or more as unpaid employees in a business run by one of their family members, or (b) were not gainfully employed but had an occupation from which they were temporarily absent due to vacation, illness, bad weather, childcare problems, maternity or paternity leave, work – management disputes, vocational training or other family-related issues or personal reasons, regardless of whether they were paid for free time or not, to find another job. Every employed person is only counted once, even if he carries out several activities.
• Unemployed. This includes all persons who were not employed during the reference week, except were available for a job in the event of temporary illness and who at some point tried to find employment during the 4-week period ending with the reference week. Individuals waiting to be recalled to a laid-off job do not need to look for work to be considered unemployed.

• Unemployment rate. The unemployment rate in the civilian labor force [i.e., 100 times (unemployed/civilian labor force)].

Seasonal adjustment

The seasonal fluctuations in the number of employed and unemployed reflect hiring and firing patterns associated with regular events such as winter and summer vacation periods. These fluctuations make it difficult to tell whether the monthly changes in employment and unemployment are due to normal seasonal patterns or to changing economic conditions. Therefore, the BLS uses a statistical technique called seasonal adjustment to address these issues. This technique uses the history of the labor force data and the job count data to identify the seasonal movements and to calculate the magnitude and direction of those movements. A seasonal adjustment factor is then developed and applied to the estimates to eliminate the effect of regular seasonal fluctuations on the data. Seasonally adjusted statistical series enable more meaningful data comparisons between months or with an annual average.

Current Population (Household) Survey (CPS)

An employment status survey for the week ending 12th^that Day of each month generates the unemployment rate statistic, which is a separate survey from the establishment survey that provides the number of jobs in the industry. The CPS survey contacted approximately 1,000 households in Hawaii to determine an individual’s current employment status. Employed persons are: 1) all persons who worked for wages or gainful employment in the survey week, 2) all persons who did at least 15 hours of unpaid work in a family business run by someone in their household, and 3) all persons who were temporarily absent from their regular work, regardless of whether they were paid or not. Unemployed people are those who do not have a job, have actively looked for work in the last four weeks and

available for work. Temporarily dismissed employees are considered unemployed, regardless of whether they were engaged in a particular activity while looking for a job. People who were not classified as employed or unemployed during the survey week are not employed.

Benchmark changes in local unemployment statistics

The statewide and sub-state data for 2010-2020 have been revised and re-estimated to reflect the revised population controls and model re-estimate.

Change in monthly employment estimates

This press release contains revised digits for the seasonally adjusted series. The revised data reflect historical corrections applied to unadjusted series at the supersector or sector level from 2004 to 2020. For years, analysts at the DLIR state research and statistics agency have developed monthly employment estimates for Hawaii and our metropolitan areas. These estimates were based on a monthly survey of Hawaiian companies and analysts’ knowledge of our local economy. Starting with the production of the preliminary estimates for March 2011, responsibility for the production of the state and metropolitan area estimates (MSA) has been transferred from the individual state agencies to the US Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS).

For Hawaii, this means that the Honolulu and Kahului-Wailuku-Lahaina MSA statewide estimates for both seasonally adjusted and non-seasonally adjusted areas are compiled by BLS. Government agencies will continue to provide the BLS with information about local events that may affect the estimates, such as strikes or major layoffs / hires in companies not covered by the survey and the latest Employment Statistics (CES) estimates for disseminate local data and analyze users. BLS believes this change is aimed at improving the cost-effectiveness of the CES program and reducing potential biases in estimates for states and territories. Part of the cost savings from this change is expected to be used in increasing survey response rates over the coming years, which will reduce statistical errors in CES estimates. Until then, state analysts believe this change could lead to increased month-to-month variability in the employment rate in the industry, particularly in the counties and islands of Hawaii. BLS can be reached at (202) 691-6533 with questions about these estimates.

The non-seasonally adjusted job estimates for Hawaii County, Kaua’i County, Maui Island, Moloka’i, and Lāna’i are prepared by the State of Hawaii Department of Labor & Industrial Relations.

Seasonally Adjusted Workforce and Unemployment Estimates for Honolulu & Maui Co.

BLS publishes smoothed seasonally adjusted estimates of the civilian workforce and unemployment for all metropolitan areas, including Honolulu City and County and Maui County. BLS publishes this data every month in Employment and unemployment in the metropolitan area Press release. The timetable is available at http://www.bls.gov/news.release/metro.toc.htm.

The six alternative government measures for underutilization of the workforce, which are based on the current population survey (CPS) and were drawn up on the basis of a 4-quarter moving average, are defined:

U-1, unemployed 15 weeks or more, as a percentage of the civilian labor force;

U-2, job losers and persons who are employed on a fixed-term basis, as a percentage of the civilian labor force;

U-3, total unemployment as a percentage of the civilian labor force (this is the definition for the official unemployment rate);

U-4, total unemployed plus discouraged workers, as a percentage of the civilian labor force plus discouraged workers;

U-5, total unemployed plus discouraged workers plus all other part-time workers *, as a percentage of the civilian labor force plus all part-time workers; and

U-6, total number of unemployed plus all marginal part-time employees plus all part-time employees for economic reasons, as a percentage of the civilian labor force plus all marginal part-time employees.

* People who are looking for a job and who are available and who in the last 12 months (or because they had not looked for a job in the four weeks before the survey, e.g. for reasons such as childcare or transport problems. Discouraged employees are a subgroup of the am Edge bound.

Note that the displayed government unemployment rates (U-3) are derived directly from the CPS. As a result, these U-3 measures may differ from the official state unemployment rates for the final period of the fourth quarter. The latter are estimates developed from statistical models that include CPS estimates as well as input data from other sources, such as data on government unemployment claims.

# # #

Media contact:

Dr. Eugene Tian

Research and Economic Analysis Department

Department of Economics, Economic Development & Tourism
(808) 586-2470
[email protected]

dbedt.Hawaii.gov/economic/

Charlene Chan

Department of Economics, Economic Development and Tourism

(808) 824-0134

[email protected]

http://dbedt.hawaii.gov