WASHINGTON -- U.S. businesses added a solid 235,000 jobs in October, according to a private survey, partly reflecting a rebound from the previous month when hiring was held back by several hurricanes.
Payroll processor ADP said Wednesday that last month's gain was the largest in seven months. Hiring fell to just 110,000 in September, the lowest in nearly a year.
October's rebound was driven by construction companies, which reported a huge gain of 62,000 jobs, the most in 11 years. That's a sign that rebuilding efforts after Hurricanes Harvey, Irma and Maria are already underway.
Manufacturers added 22,000 jobs, and professional and technical services, a category that includes higher-paying jobs such as architects and engineers, gained 68,000. A category that includes hotel and restaurant workers added 45,000. Payrolls at business services providers added 109,000, the highest in records to 2002.
The government's jobs report for September showed that damage from the hurricanes caused a loss of 33,000 jobs that month, the first drop in seven years. The ADP report doesn't include government payrolls and often diverges from the official figures.
Economists forecast that the Labor Department's report for October, to be released Friday, will show a much bigger gain of 308,000 jobs.
Mark Zandi, chief economist at Moody's Analytics, which compiles the ADP report, said the gap between the ADP and government figures reflects the way the two numbers are calculated. If a business was closed during the hurricanes and employees weren't paid, that would be counted as a job loss in the government data.
But if they remain on the company's payroll and can return to their jobs after the storms, they are likely to be counted as employed in the ADP figures. As a result, the ADP data are less affected by the storms than the government figures, Zandi said.
Aside from the effects of the hurricanes, "the job market is still very healthy," he added.
A monthly survey of business leaders suggests that economic conditions continued to improve last month for nine Midwestern and Plains states, according to a report released Wednesday.
The Mid-America Business Conditions Index rose to 58.8 in October from 58.2 in September and 57.5 in August, the report states.
"Both the national and our regional indices indicate the manufacturing sector is expanding at a very healthy pace and that this expansion will spill over into the broader national and regional economies in the next three to six months," said Creighton University economist Ernie Goss, who oversees the survey.
The survey results are compiled into a collection of indexes ranging from zero to 100. Survey organizers say any score above 50 suggests growth in that factor. A score below that suggests decline. The survey covers Arkansas, Iowa, Kansas, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, North Dakota, Oklahoma and South Dakota.
The regional wholesale inflation gauge fell to a still lofty 75.0 from September's six-year high of 79.6, continuing to reflect inflationary pressures.
Information for this article was contributed by Bloomberg News.
Business on 11/02/2017