Payrolls Climb in 31 States, Led by New York, Texas; Nevada Is at Bottom

Employers in New York boosted staff by 29,400 workers, while those in Texas added 29,300, figures from the Labor Department showed today in Washington. Joblessness increased by 0.4 percentage point in Illinois, Michigan, Minnesota and South Carolina. Nevada continued to lead the nation in unemployment with a rate of 12.9 percent.

Widespread job growth is needed to shore up incomes after spending among consumers ground to a halt in the second quarter, raising concern the world’s largest economy was stalling. A Labor Department report on Aug. 5 showed employers added 117,000 workers to payrolls last month and the jobless rate fell to 9.1 percent.

“The overall labor market was doing better than previous months but the bigger point is that it’s a lot weaker than earlier in the year,” Paul Dales, senior U.S. economist at Capital Economics Ltd. In Toronto, said before the report. “That’s a concern given that any data from July won’t reflect the market turmoil in the last couple of weeks that really could have prompted some businesses to postpone or cancel any hiring plans.”