Private sector employment increased by 110,000 jobs from September to October on a seasonally adjusted basis, according to the latest ADP National Employment Report.
At the same time, after reaching a 28-month high in September, the number of planned job cuts announced by U.S.-based employers plunged in October to 42,759, the lowest monthly total since June. Meanwhile, planned hiring announcements approached 160,000, as several employers revealed their seasonal employment strategies, according to global outplacement firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas Inc.
The ADP National Employment Report, created by Automatic Data Processing Inc. in partnership with Macroeconomic Advisers LLC, is derived from actual payroll data and measures the change in total nonfarm private employment each month.
Its October 2011 report is good news for the office sector of
commercial real estate as the service sector showed a jobs boost of 114,000 positions; but bad news for the industrial sector as manufacturing employment dropped by 4,000 jobs.
"October's job growth came exclusively from the services sector," said Gary C. Butler, CEO of ADP. "Such a result explains the growth in professional and business services employment. It also reflects manufacturers' uncertainty around investment and hiring."
The latest report on planned job cuts shows that downsizing activity in October declined 63% from September.
The biggest declines in October job cuts occurred in the financial and government sectors. Job cuts in the financial sector plunged 98%.
"Job cuts in government and financial services dropped significantly last month, but the two sectors are not out of the woods, by any means. Most of the government cuts this year were at the state level. We have yet to see the full impact of mandated federal spending cuts. Anticipated cuts at the U.S. Post Office alone could result in more than 200,000 job cuts," said John A. Challenger, CEO of Challenger, Gray & Christmas.
"Meanwhile, the European debt crisis is wreaking havoc on Wall Street. Commercial banks and mortgage lenders are still unstable in the wake of the housing collapse. Home sales and prices have rebounded only slightly and the millions of homes in foreclosure are basically ticking time bombs sitting on the banks' balance sheets," he added.
"We seem to be in a pattern of two or more consecutive months with low job-cut totals, followed by a sudden spike one month, typically resulting from a small number of large layoffs. But, this is not surprising in light of how slow and uneven this recovery has been. We will probably see more of the same through the first half of 2012," Challenger said.
Is service sector job creation translating into more office absorption? Let us know here.
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