US Unemployment Rate by Industry (2024)
Unemployment rates are a strong indicator of a market’s performance and are key to understanding its potential. If you’re thinking about starting a business in the United States, knowing what the latest unemployment rates are according to industry can help guide your decision on what sector to break into. Here’s a look at a recent analysis of unemployment rates by industry.
US unemployment rate by industry: table
|
Industry |
Unemployment rate in June 2023 |
Unemployment rate in June 2024 |
|
Information |
3.1% |
5.9% |
|
Leisure and hospitality |
5.1% |
5.2% |
|
Wholesale and retail trade |
4.4% |
5.1% |
|
Transportation and utilities |
3.1% |
4.5% |
|
Professional and business services |
3.3% |
3.7% |
|
Construction |
3.6% |
3.3% |
|
Manufacturing |
2.6% |
3.1% |
|
Education and health services |
2.8% |
3.1% |
|
Financial activities |
2.2% |
2.7% |
|
Mining, quarrying, and oil and gas extraction |
1.3% |
1.3% |
|
Other services |
2.1% |
3.9% |
Unemployment rate by industry: top five
According to the latest numbers published by the US Bureau of Labor Statistics, the information industry currently has the highest unemployment rate. As of June 2024, this figure stands at 5.9%, which means that around one out of every 17 people aged 16 and above working in this sector is out of work. This equates to a workforce of 147,000 people and represents a 2.8 percentage point increase from the sector’s unemployment rate in June 2023.
Second on the list charting the unemployment rate by industry is leisure and hospitality. 5.2% of workers in this sector are unemployed, which is around 743,000 people. This is a fractional 0.1 percentage point rise from a year ago. This is followed by the wholesale and retail trade industry, which has an unemployment rate of 5.1%. This is also the sector with the highest number of unemployed workers, currently at 988,000. Transportation and utilities and professional and business services complete the five industries with the highest unemployment rates—4.5% and 3.7% of people in these two lines of business are jobless, respectively.
Unemployment rate by industry: others
Next on the ranking of unemployment rate by industry is construction, with 3.3%, a 0.3 percentage point annual decrease. The manufacturing and education and health services sectors follow. Both have rates of 3.1%, accounting for 469,000 unemployed people in the manufacturing industry and 823,000 in the education and health services industry.
Employment rates among workers in the financial activities industry experienced a 0.5 percentage point annual increase, from 2.2% in June 2023 to 2.7% in June 2024. Rounding out the list of unemployment rate by industry is mining, quarry, and oil and gas extraction, which saw its rate hold steady at 1.3%.
Of all the industries, the only one whose unemployment rate fell from the previous year is construction, from 3.6% to 3.3%.