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Nonfarm Payrolls (NFP)

Macro & the Fed

Nonfarm payrolls is the number of paid jobs the US economy added or lost in a month, excluding farm workers, private household employees and the self-employed.

It is part of the BLS monthly jobs report, usually released on the first Friday of the month at 8:30 a.m. New York time. The figure is revised over the following two months, so a single month's number can change noticeably later. Markets compare it with expectations and also look at wage growth in the same report.

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The Jobs Data: Payrolls, Unemployment and JOLTSThe single number released on the first Friday of the month is the report card for one of the Fed's two mandates — and sometimes good news is bad news.