Employment report: Trucking industry gained 700 jobs in August

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The for-hire trucking industry added 700 jobs on a seasonally adjusted basis in the month of August, according to the Department of Labor’s monthly employment report, released Sept. 4.

This is the fifth consecutive month that for-hire trucking employment has added jobs, and the seventh time (out of eight months) in 2015, continuing a years-long trend of job gains in the industry.

The U.S. economy has a whole added 173,000 jobs in the month, pushing the country’s unemployment rate to 5.1 percent — the lowest in nearly a decade.

The DOL did downwardly revise trucking’s preliminary employment figures for July and June, edging each down a few hundred jobs.

For-hire trucking employment now totals 1.4588 million on a seasonally adjusted basis, the DOL reports, a figure that recently topped trucking’s previous employment high from January 2007.

The broader trade, transportation and utilities sector added 28,000 jobs in the month. Manufacturing, however, in an otherwise strong year for hiring, lost 17,000 jobs in the month. Construction added 3,000 jobs, while the retail sector added 11,000.

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