• Manufacturing employment increased by 32,000 in October, up from 23,000 in September and continuing to rise solidly. Currently, the manufacturing sector has 12,922,000 employees, the most since November 2008. The average hourly earnings of production and nonsupervisory workers in manufacturing rose 0.4% from $25.25 in September to $25.35 in October, up 4.9% from one year ago.
  • The labor market remained a bright spot in an economy that has seen softening in other areas. Through the first 10 months of 2022, the sector hired 367,000 employees, building on the 365,000 workers added in calendar year 2021 and the most so far of any year since 1994
  • There were 806,000 manufacturing job openings in September, averaging 853,000 over the past 12 months, remaining well above pre-pandemic levels. Nonfarm business job openings totaled 10,717,000 in September, which translated into 53.7 unemployed workers for every 100 job openings in the U.S. economy. There continues to be more job openings than people actively looking for work.
  • Meanwhile, manufacturing activity stalled, with the ISM® Manufacturing Purchasing Managers’ Index® dropping to 50.2 in October, the lowest reading since May 2020. New orders contracted for the second straight month, and exports deteriorated further. On the other hand, production strengthened somewhat, with hiring stabilizing after falling in the prior survey.
  • More encouragingly, the index for supplier deliveries reflected faster growth for the first time since February 2016, which indicates that the long wait times that have become prevalent over the past year have started to wane. Nonetheless, customer inventories remained too low.