Broadcast Employment Remains Steady In July.

The U.S. job market showed some softness in July, and the broadcast sector wasn’t immune. While the government doesn’t release radio-specific data, the Bureau of Labor Statistics says the overall broadcasting and content creation sector saw employment decline 1.5% from the prior month. That gives back some gains it reported in the industry for June. BLS says 335,800 people were working across the sector, down 1,500 month-to-month.

The number of people working in advertising and public relations is closely tied to how well media companies can expect to do in the coming months, and the government’s July data shows those numbers were also weaker. BLS says the ad sector’s workforce decreased 0.8%. That puts it at 475,900 — down about 800 jobs from a year earlier across the entire industry.

The government says total nonfarm payroll employment declined by 23,000 in July, despite analysts predicting monthly gains. The unemployment rate dropped slightly to 4.1%, driven by fewer layoffs and fewer people quitting their jobs. Among the unemployed, the number of people on temporary layoff increased by 153,000 to 921,000 in July.

Revisions to earlier months show hiring levels in May were revised downward by 66,000, and June was revised downward by 37,000. With these revisions, employment in May and June combined is 103,000 less than previously reported.

BLS says the strongest gains in July occurred health care, while retail, education and government sectors all lost jobs. But most industries were like broadcasting, and had relatively little swing in their monthly numbers.

Average hourly earnings for all private-sector production and nonsupervisory employees rose by four cents to $32.50. Over the past 12 months, average hourly earnings have increased 3.5%. The average workweek for all employees remained at 34.3 hours.

Kory Kantenga, Head of Economics at LinkedIn, says the latest numbers may grab headlines as they are a rare dip, but he thinks the data offers a good reason for why payroll data may not be the best indicator of labor market health.

“The unemployment rate, LinkedIn data, and other private sector data all point to a labor market that remains stable,” Kantenga says. “Today's negative payroll print was driven by a one-off shortfall in seasonal public education hiring.” That said, he also writes in a post that the report highlights the job market has also added few jobs outside of healthcare, which is working to keep wage growth modest. “This is not a labor market that’s reaccelerating despite speculation to the contrary earlier this year,” Katenga says.