The services sector continued to expand in September, the Institute for Supply Management reports. Its Non-Manufacturing Index increased to 55.1 last month, up from 53.7 in August. That’s a sign that the services sector overall grew at a faster pace in September, ISM advises. It’s also another clue for thinking that the U.S. economy continued growing last month. Indeed, with today’s ADP Employment Report and Monday’s release of the September update of the ISM Manufacturing Index, we now have three indicators that collectively suggest that last month wasn’t the start of a new recession.
Daily Archives: October 3, 2012
ADP: A Modest Gain For September Payrolls
Private non-farm payrolls increased by 162,000 last month, according to this morning’s ADP Employment update for September. That’s down a bit from August’s revised 189,000 gain, which suggests that we should keep our expectations in check for Friday’s official September jobs report from the Labor Department. Nonetheless, there’s nothing conspicuously dark in today’s data dump to suggest that the slow growth trend rolled over last month. In fact, when you consider today’s ADP release with yesterday’s mild rebound in the ISM Manufacturing Index last month, the case is a bit stronger for expecting September to remain in the growth camp (once all the month’s numbers are published).