Breaking: Truck transportation jobs dropped slightly in May

Photo: Jim Allen/FreightWaves

The number of workers employed in the Truck Transportation sector tracked by the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) fell slightly in May, to 1,431,600 from 1,432,800 the month before.

That figure was reported in the monthly unemployment statistics released today by BLS. The BLS reported that total non-farm payroll employment in May was up by 2.5 million, with the unemployment rate falling to 13.3%. That is down 1.4 percentage points.

The monthly BLS survey also reported that rail industry employment declined to 153,200 from 155,300 a month earlier. A year ago, it was 178,000. 

FreightWaves will add to this story later this morning.

John Kingston

John has an almost 50-year career as a journalist, most of them covering commodities and markets. The largest part of his career was spent at Platts, now part of S&P Global Energy. He created the Dated Brent benchmark, now the world’s most important crude oil marker. He was Director of Oil, Director of News, the editor in chief of Platts Oilgram News and the “talking head” for Platts on numerous media outlets, including CNBC, Fox Business and Canada’s BNN. He covered metals before joining Platts and then spent a year running Platts’ metals business as well. He was awarded the International Association of Energy Economics Award for Excellence in Written Journalism in 2015. In 2010, he won two Corporate Achievement Awards from McGraw-Hill, an extremely rare accomplishment. He was awarded the 2020 Abdullah Bin Hamad Al-Attiyah International Energy Award for Lifetime Achievement for the Advancement of International Energy Journalism.