October Indiana Employment Report

Participation rate remains above the national rate of 61.6 percent.

INDIANAPOLIS (November 19, 2021) – SPECIAL NOTE: Indiana’s unemployment rate for September 2021, which stood at 4.0% when released on Oct. 22, has since been revised downward to 3.5% by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS).

Indiana’s labor force participation rate for September also has been revised downward by BLS, from 63.0% to 62.9%.

BLS made the revision after discovering an immediate change needed to the unemployment rate model that affected the East North Central Region, which includes Indiana, Illinois, Michigan, Ohio and Wisconsin. 

BLS said unemployment statistical models used to calculate labor force data have been greatly affected by the COVID-19 pandemic. Effective October 2021, BLS changed its approach to detecting and adjusting for outliers in monthly statewide data. The distortions made to January-August 2021 statewide labor force estimates will be modified during the annual benchmarking process in February 2022.  

For more information from BLS, please click this link: https://www.bls.gov/lau/launews1.htm.

Indiana’s unemployment rate stands at 3.3 percent for October, and the national rate is 4.6 percent. The monthly unemployment rate is a U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) indicator that reflects the number of unemployed people seeking employment within the prior four weeks as a percentage of the labor force.

Indiana’s labor force had a net decrease of 9,183 over the previous month. This was a result of a decrease of 7,030 unemployed residents and a decrease of 2,153 employed residents. 

Indiana's total labor force, which includes both Hoosiers employed and those seeking employment, stands at 3.33 million, and the state’s 62.7 percent labor force participation rate remains above the national rate of 61.6 percent.

Learn more about how unemployment rates are calculated here: http://www.hoosierdata.in.gov/infographics/employment-status.asp.

Employment by Sector

Private sector employment has increased by 66,000 over the year and increased by 14,600 over the previous month. The monthly increase is primarily due to gains in the Manufacturing (5,800) and the Trade, Transportation and Utilities (4,100) sectors. Gains were offset by losses in the Private Education and Health Services (-1,000) and the All Other, which includes Mining, Logging, Information, and other services except Public Administration, (-200) sectors. Total private employment stands at 2,670,500, which is 70,000 below the December 2019 peak.

Midwest Unemployment Rates