Research Brief: Employment – May 2018

Year-to-date employment growth signals economic acceleration.  Employment additions in the first four months of 2018 outpaced the previous two years over the same time frame, with 799,000 jobs added.  The quickened pace of job growth should accelerate commercial real estate demand across all sector, as companies expand payrolls and operations.

Increased employment setting stage for escalating apartment demand.  The number of workers unemployed or working part-time involuntarily moved to the lowest level in the expansion, at 7.8 percent.  It peaked at 17 percent in 2009.  Many of these workers making the jump from part-time to full-time employment are young adults living with their parents.  Now that they are employed full-time, a good deal of them should be able to move out and form their own households.  Currently, 23 million young adults live with their parents.  After peaking in 2016, the number of young adults living at home declined by 400,000 last year, a sign of pent-up household formations releasing.

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