Total nonfarm employment in the Boston-Cambridge-Quincy metropolitan area1 stood at 2,490,000 in January 2013, up 47,600 from one year ago, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported today. Regional Commissioner Deborah A. Brown noted that from January 2012 to January 2013, nonfarm employment rose 1.9 percent locally compared to 1.5 percent nationwide. (See chart 1 and table 1; Technical Note at end of release contains metropolitan area definitions. All data in this release are not seasonally adjusted; accordingly, over-the-year analysis is used throughout.)

The Boston-Cambridge-Quincy area includes nine metropolitan divisions – separately identifiable employment centers within the larger metropolitan area. The Boston-Cambridge-Quincy Metropolitan Division, which made up 69 percent of the workforce, gained 30,700 jobs from January 2012 to January 2013, accounting for 64 percent of the area’s growth. Five of the other six divisions for which data are published also added jobs over the year.

Industry employment

Education and health services, the largest industry in the Boston area, had the highest employment gain from January 2012, up 14,900. Over-the-year employment increases have been recorded in the supersector since April 2001 without interruption. In fact, the most recent over-the-year gain was the largest since December 2007. The 2.9-percent growth rate in this industry was above the national average of 2.0 percent.

The second-highest job gainer in the Boston area was professional and business services, with an increase of 13,300 from January 2012 to January 2013. The 3.3-percent rate of job growth in Boston’s professional and business services industry outpaced the 2.7-percent gain nationwide.

 

Local employment in both construction and trade, transportation, and utilities rose by 3,900 from January 2012. While the 5.2-percent gain in the Boston construction industry was well above the 2.0-percent increase recorded nationally, the local rate of employment growth in trade, transportation, and utilities (1.0 percent) was below the national average (1.7 percent).

Elsewhere in the Boston area four industries added between 1,900 and 2,900 jobs—government, other services, information, and leisure and hospitality. The 1.0-percent gain recorded in government was in contrast to a 0.4 percent decline nationwide.

Employment in the 12 largest metropolitan areas

Boston was 1 of the nation’s 12 largest metropolitan statistical areas in January 2013. All of these areas experienced over-the-year job growth during the period, with eight exceeding the national average of 1.5 percent. The fastest rate of job growth was registered in Houston, up 4.5 percent, three times the national rate of gain. The slowest rate of expansion occurred in Detroit, up 0.3 percent. (See chart 3 and table 2.)

The New York area added the largest number of jobs, 153,000, from January 2012. Houston, Dallas, and Los Angeles all registered job gains numbering between 100,000 and 120,000. Employment in San Francisco, Atlanta, and Chicago expanded by more than 50,000. Only Detroit had an employment increase of less than 5,000 over the year.

Professional and business services registered the largest over-the-year employment gains in 6 of the 12 metropolitan areas–Atlanta, Chicago, Dallas, Los Angeles, New York, and San Francisco. Trade, transportation, and utilities and education and health services each led the job increases in two metropolitan areas; leisure and hospitality and manufacturing experienced the largest job increase in one area each from January 2012 to January 2013.

Government recorded the largest job loss in four areas–Atlanta, Los Angeles, Miami, and Philadelphia. In Boston, Houston, and San Francisco there were no annual job losses for any supersector.

Additional information

Information in this release will be made available to sensory impaired individuals upon request. Voice phone: 202-691-5200; TDD message referral phone: 1-800-877-8339.

Technical Note

This release presents nonfarm payroll employment estimates from the Current Employment Statistics (CES) program. The CES survey is a Federal-State cooperative endeavor between State employment security agencies and the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Industry employment data for all states and metropolitan areas from the CES program are available on the Internet at www.bls.gov/sae/.

Definitions. Employment data refer to persons on establishment payrolls who receive pay for any part of the pay period that includes the 12th of the month. Persons are counted at their place of work rather than at their place of residence; those appearing on more than one payroll are counted on each payroll. Industries are classified on the basis of their principal activity in accordance with the 2007 version of the North American Industry Classification System.

Method of estimation. The employment data are estimated using a "link relative" technique in which a ratio (link relative) of current-month employment to that of the previous month is computed from a sample of establishments reporting for both months. The estimates of employment for the current month are obtained by multiplying the estimates for the previous month by these ratios. Small-domain models are used as the official estimators for the approximately 39 percent of CES published series which have insufficient sample for direct sample-based estimates. More complete information on the technical procedures used to develop these estimates and additional data appear in Employment and Earnings, which is available on line at www.bls.gov/opub/ee/home.htm.   

Annual revisions. Employment estimates are adjusted annually to a complete count of jobs, called benchmarks, derived principally from tax reports that are submitted by employers who are covered under state unemployment insurance (UI) laws. The benchmark information is used to adjust the monthly estimates between the new benchmark and the preceding one and also to establish the level of employment for the new benchmark month. Thus, the benchmarking process establishes the level of employment, and the sample is used to measure the month-to-month changes in the level for the subsequent months.

Reliability of the estimates. The estimates presented in this release are based on sample surveys, administrative data, and modeling and, thus, are subject to sampling and other types of errors. Sampling error is a measure of sampling variability—that is, variation that occurs by chance because a sample rather than the entire population is surveyed. Survey data also are subject to nonsampling errors, such as those which can be introduced into the data collection and processing operations. Estimates not directly derived from sample surveys are subject to additional errors resulting from the specific estimation processes used. The sums of individual items may not always equal the totals shown in the same tables because of rounding.

Employment estimates. Measures of sampling error are available for state CES data at the total nonfarm and supersector level on line at www.bls.gov/sae/790stderr.htm. Information on recent benchmark revisions for states is available on the BLS Web site at www.bls.gov/sae/.

Area definitions. The substate area data published in this release reflect the standards and definitions established by the U.S. Office of Management and Budget on December 1, 2009. A detailed list of geographic definitions is available at www.bls.gov/lau/lausmsa.htm.

The Boston-Cambridge-Quincy, Mass.-N.H. Metropolitan New England City and Town Area (NECTA) includes nine NECTA divisions--subdivisions of the larger NECTA which function as distinct social, economic, and cultural areas within the larger region. The NECTA divisions that compose the Boston-Cambridge-Quincy, MA-NH NECTA include: Boston-Cambridge-Quincy, MA, Brockton-Bridgewater-Easton, MA, Framingham, MA, Haverhill-North Andover-Amesbury, MA-NH, Lawrence-Methuen-Salem, MA-NH, Lowell-Billerica-Chelmsford, MA-NH, Nashua, NH-MA, Peabody, MA, Taunton-Norton-Raynham, MA, and select cities and towns within.

 

Table 1. Employees on nonfarm payrolls by industry supersector, U.S. and Boston metropolitan area, not seasonally adjusted (numbers in thousands)

Area and Industry	Jan. 2012	Nov. 2012	Dec. 2012	Jan. 2013(p)	Change from Jan. 2012 to Jan. 2013
					Number	Percent
U.S.
Total nonfarm	130,657	135,636	135,560	132,644	1,987	1.5
Natural resources and mining	824	853	855	845	21	2.5
Construction	5,237	5,779	5,622	5,341	104	2.0
Manufacturing	11,735	11,939	11,939	11,854	119	1.0
Trade transportation and utilities	25,169	26,208	26,425	25,608	439	1.7
Information	2,639	2,693	2,685	2,639	0	0.0
Financial activities	7,683	7,821	7,846	7,789	106	1.4
Professional and business services	17,337	18,266	18,237	17,809	472	2.7
Educational and health services	19,976	20,675	20,673	20,370	394	2.0
Leisure and hospitality	12,904	13,598	13,591	13,257	353	2.7
Other services	5,343	5,452	5,448	5,408	65	1.2
Government	21,810	22,352	22,239	21,724	-86	-0.4
Boston-Cambridge-Quincy MA-NH
Total nonfarm	2,442.4	2,539.3	2,539.9	2,490.0	47.6	1.9
Natural resources and mining	0.4	0.5	0.5	0.4	0.0	0.0
Construction	75.4	88.3	85.2	79.3	3.9	5.2
Manufacturing	192.1	193.8	193.8	192.9	0.8	0.4
Trade transportation and utilities	403.1	414.2	419.9	407.0	3.9	1.0
Information	74.3	76.3	76.0	76.4	2.1	2.8
Financial activities	170.7	173.3	174.1	171.9	1.2	0.7
Professional and business services	403.4	425.7	424.0	416.7	13.3	3.3
Educational and health services	506.1	527.7	527.8	521.0	14.9	2.9
Leisure and hospitality	219.8	230.4	228.8	221.7	1.9	0.9
Other services	94.4	99.2	98.1	97.1	2.7	2.9
Government	302.7	309.9	311.7	305.6	2.9	1.0
Boston-Cambridge-Quincy MA division
Total nonfarm	1,688.1	1,758.8	1,757.2	1,718.8	30.7	1.8
Natural resources and mining	0.3	0.3	0.3	0.2	-0.1	-33.3
Construction	46.4	55.8	54.5	50.8	4.4	9.5
Manufacturing	91.3	91.6	91.9	91.0	-0.3	-0.3
Trade transportation and utilities	403.1	414.2	419.9	407.0	3.9	1.0
Information	57.8	59.9	59.8	60.1	2.3	4.0
Financial activities	141.6	143.7	144.0	142.0	0.4	0.3
Professional and business services	304.7	322.1	320.1	314.9	10.2	3.3
Educational and health services	383.2	400.4	400.4	390.9	7.7	2.0
Leisure and hospitality	154.9	163.7	162.0	155.8	0.9	0.6
Other services	65.8	69.6	68.4	67.6	1.8	2.7
Government	199.7	202.3	203.2	200.6	0.9	0.5