Employment by Industry (U.S.): In March 2023, the total number of seasonally adjusted (SA), non-farm people employed in the U.S. was 155.6 million (M) – an increase of 236,000 (+0.2%) month on month (m/m). When compared to March 2022, total employment is up by 2.7% year on year (y/y). Among the employment sectors that we track at Gerdau, we saw the greatest monthly gain in the heavy and civil engineering construction sector with a growth of 0.6% m/m.

The SA service-providing sector gained 243,000 jobs to reach total employment of 134.1M people in March, which is +0.2% m/m and +2.8% y/y.

The SA goods-producing sector employed 21.5M people in March – down 7,000 m/m (-0.03%), and up by 2.4% y/y. The service-providing sector is creating jobs at a faster rate than the goods-producing sector this month.

Figure 1 shows seasonally adjusted manufacturing and construction employment on the same chart from 2005 to present. Construction employment shrunk while manufacturing employment remained flat this month.

The SA manufacturing sector employed 13.0M people in March – down 1,000 m/m (flat m/m), and up 2.1% y/y. The two employment categories within manufacturing that we pay the most attention to are 1) motor vehicles & parts, and 2) transportation equipment. This month, there were 1.05M employed in the manufacture of motor vehicles and parts, up 4,000 m/m. The transportation equipment field employed 1.79M workers, up 6,000 m/m.

The SA construction sector employed a total of 7.9M – down 9,000 m/m, and increasing by 2.5% y/y. Most construction workers are employed constructing buildings. In March, there were 1.8M workers constructing buildings, decreasing 0.1% m/m and up 3.2% y/y. Heavy and civil engineering was the next largest construction category, employing 1.1M in March – increasing 0.6% m/m, and up 3.6% y/y.

At Gerdau, we keep an eye on national employment data – especially within manufacturing and construction – since this is where most long product steel is used. In addition, we know that growth in net job creation correlates to increased steel consumption.