Source: US Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), Current Employment Statistics (CES) survey. Distributed via FRED (Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis).
Data through: September 2026 · updated Oct 2 · Updates: Monthly · Next: Nov 6
MThe three bars show the last 3 months for this indicator, oldest left to newest right. Bar height reflects each reading relative to the other two — the tallest is the highest of the three, the shortest the lowest.
↑ 0.0% MoM↑ 0.5% YoY
Historical context: Currently in the 29th percentile of all historical readings.
What this means right now: Hiring is weak — fewer than 75K jobs a month. That has happened in 110 months since 1950; 10 of them fell inside a recession, 24 came in the year before one began and 16 in the year after one ended. After 12 months, unemployment was higher in 47 of those months and lower in 55 — no clear tilt either way.
Private Nonfarm Payrolls · Monthly · 1939–2026
NBER recessions
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Monthly values
Private Nonfarm Payrolls — the last 12 months
Every month's reading, with the band the heatmap gives it. The chart above shows the same series in full.
Month
Value
Band
Sep 2026
+46K
Concerning reading
Aug 2026
+89K
Within normal range
Jul 2026
+28K
Concerning reading
Jun 2026
+26K
Concerning reading
May 2026
+61K
Concerning reading
Apr 2026
+150K
Healthy reading
Month-end readings of the same series the chart shows, from private_payrolls_mom. Values are the current record, not point-in-time: a month that has since been revised shows its revised value.
What is the Private Payrolls?
Private Nonfarm Payrolls counts paid workers at US businesses and nonprofits — everyone on a payroll except government employees, farm workers and household staff. The Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) reports it monthly in the jobs report, early in the following month on a date set in advance.
It is most of the job market: 136 million workers in Sep 2026, or 85% of all nonfarm jobs. Because it leaves out government, it shows hiring driven by business conditions rather than by public budgets.
When the NBER dates recessions, payroll employment is one of the monthly series it weighs — the total count including government, not this private one.
How We Color-Code the Private Payrolls
Our heatmap colors this indicator against historically significant thresholds:
Below 0K
Job losses — about half of the 200 months of losses since 1950 (99) fell inside a recession, and 12 of the 16 runs of three or more losing months (through September 2026) touched one
0K – 75K
Weak hiring — 0K to 75K a month, 110 months since 1950; a year later unemployment was higher in 47 of them and lower in 55 — no clear tilt
75K – 150K
Modest hiring — 75K to 150K a month, 164 months since 1950; a year later unemployment was more often lower (96) than higher (57)
150K – 250K
Solid hiring — 150K to 250K a month, 245 months since 1950, 0 of them inside a recession
Above 250K
Strong hiring — above 250K a month, 201 months since 1950; a year later unemployment was lower in most of them (164) and higher in 26
Historical Extremes — What Happened Next?
When this indicator reaches extreme levels, history shows consistent patterns:
Apr 2020Pandemic shutdown (a one-off)
−19.6M
The biggest one-month loss of private jobs in US history, as the country shut down for COVID. Unemployment jumped to 14.8% the same month.
Mar 2009Financial-crisis low point
−808K
The worst month of job losses in the 2008-2009 financial crisis. Unemployment kept climbing to 10% by October 2009 before the recovery began.
Dec 2007Last gain before the recession
+63K
The last small gain before the Great Recession. The NBER later dated the recession's start to this very month.
Feb 2020Last month before COVID
+186K
The last month of the longest expansion in US history — 128 months, from July 2009 to February 2020. Unemployment stood at 3.5%, a 50-year low.
Jul 2021Post-pandemic hiring peak
+934K
The strongest month of hiring once the 2020 rehiring rush had passed. Unemployment was 5.4% and wages were rising 4.3% a year. By April 2022 unemployment had fallen to 3.7% and wage growth had climbed to 5.8%, and job openings had hit a record 12.3 million in March 2022.
Jun 2020Reopening surge (a one-off)
+4.6M
The biggest one-month gain of private jobs in US history, as states reopened and furloughed workers were called back. It recovered only part of what had been lost.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is the difference between private nonfarm payrolls and total nonfarm payrolls?
Total nonfarm payrolls counts everyone, including government workers; private payrolls leaves out federal, state and local government. That matters because government hiring follows budgets and politics — census hiring, hiring freezes, state budget cuts — rather than business conditions. Private payrolls is the cleaner read on demand for workers. Total nonfarm is simply private plus government, and private made up 85% of the total in Sep 2026.
How is private nonfarm payrolls measured and revised?
The BLS gets it from a monthly survey of employers, the Current Employment Statistics survey. The first estimate arrives about a week after the month ends — within ten days in nearly every report since 1960 (770 of 799, through July 2026). It is then revised in each of the next two monthly reports, and it almost always changes: from 2000 to 2024, all three estimates differed in 298 of 300 months. Once a year the BLS also re-anchors the whole series to a near-complete count of employers (the Quarterly Census of Employment and Wages), which can shift past figures substantially.
What sectors are included in private nonfarm payrolls?
Every private industry. On the goods side: mining and logging, construction and manufacturing. On the services side: trade, transportation, utilities, information, finance, professional and business services, education and health, leisure and hospitality, and other services. Services are the great majority — 84.1% of private jobs as of Sep 2026, from 80.4% twenty years earlier — as the economy has kept shifting toward services. Farm workers and household staff are left out; nonprofits are included.
What private payroll growth rate is healthy for the US economy?
There is no single figure — it depends on how fast the workforce is growing. Since 2023, private hiring of about 40K to 50K a month has been enough to keep the unemployment rate steady. In the 2011–2019 expansion it took about 150K to 200K, three to four times as much. In the 1990s and 2000s, unemployment fell by three tenths of a point or more over a year when hiring averaged roughly 160K to 250K a month, and rose that much only when private jobs were shrinking. Since 2023 it has risen that much on gains averaging about 75K a month. Months of job losses, outside sudden shocks, are usually recession months: of the 200 since 1950, 106 fell inside a recession and 141 came within a year of one.
What is the difference between BLS Private Payrolls (USPRIV) and ADP Private Payrolls?
They measure the same thing from different sources. ADP, a large payroll processor, counts the paychecks it handles for its own clients and publishes on the Wednesday before the BLS report — two days earlier. The BLS figure comes from its official survey of employers. In any one month the two often disagree: the typical gap since 2010 has been 58K (leaving out 2020). Over a year they nearly always agree on direction: their twelve-month totals had the same sign in 185 of 188 months since 2010, and their six-month totals in 188 of 194, through August 2026. The size still differs — ADP's twelve-month total has run from two thirds of the BLS total to 15% above it in the middle 80% of months. The BLS series is the official one; ADP simply arrives first.