Healthcare employment recovery slowed in November

Healthcare employment inched up slightly in November—by 0.3%—just shy of its October growth rate.

The healthcare industry added 46,000 jobs last month as modest ambulatory gains were tempered by losses in the nursing home sector, according to preliminary numbers from the Bureau of Labor Statistics released Friday. That's down from 66,500 new hires in October.

The pace of hiring in healthcare, and across most employment sectors, recovered sharply in May and June after abrupt drops in March and April as companies shed workers due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Since then, though, monthly growth has been sluggish.

As usual, healthcare's biggest gains were in the ambulatory sector, which added an estimated 51,700 jobs in November. That's down from 60,500 jobs added in October. Within ambulatory, physicians' offices added the most jobs in November: 20,900, up 0.8% from October.

Home health added 13,000 jobs, up 0.9% from October. Outpatient care centers added 5,500 jobs, up 0.6% over the prior month.

Hospitals added an estimated 4,700 jobs in November, which represented a tiny, 0.1% uptick from October's total. By comparison, hospitals made 17,200 new hires in October.

The nursing and residential care sectors continue to suffer the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic. Nursing homes shed an estimated 12,100 jobs in November, a 0.8% drop from the prior month. That's roughly double the number of jobs they lost in October. The pandemic exposed longstanding infection control and staffing problems in nursing homes, and some data show patients and their families continue to steer clear of such facilities.

Community care facilities for the elderly added 2,900 jobs in November after shedding 4,400 in the prior month.

Total nonfarm employment grew by 245,000 in November, and the unemployment rate shrunk by 0.2 percentage points to 6.7%. Of the unemployed, 2.8 million were on temporary layoff in November, down from a high of 18.1 million in April, but 2 million higher than in February.