In August, US employment dropped by 216 000, according to the official payrolls report. The outcome was somewhat better than expected (-230 000), but the previous figure was downwardly revised from -247 000 to -276 000 and the June outcome was downwardly adjusted from -443 000 to -463 000. All revisions taken into account, the payrolls were 35 000 below expectations. Looking at the details, private payrolls dropped by 198 000, while government payrolls fell by 18 000. In the goodsproducing sector, employment declined by 136 000 (from -122 000) of which 63 000 (from -43 000) in manufacturing. In the service providing sector, 80 000 jobs were lost, which is significantly better than in the previous month (-154 000). The civilian labour force rose slightly from 154.50 million to 154.58 million, while the number of people unemployed rose from 14.46M to 14.93M. In August, the US unemployment rate rose from 9.4% to 9.7%, while the consensus was looking for a figure of 9.5%. The unexpected rise was driven by people re-entering the labour market, probably encouraged by the most recent positive news that give new hope to find a job to many before discouraged people that had left the workforce. This is a typical development in the early stages of a recovery. Temporary help agencies, which often lead overall payrolls changes, showed a marginal improvement from -8 000 to -7 000. Education and health added 52 000 jobs (from 21 000). Average weekly hours worked stayed unchanged at 33.1 in August, while aggregate hours worked dropped from 99.2 to 98.9 (-0.3% M/m). Although the report came out broadly in line with expectations, it is an encouraging sign that the trend of slowing job losses was extended in August.