Over the summer 2024, overall printing employment had been generally flat, a situation which continued through the autumn. For the last several months of the year, production and non-production employment alternated being up and down. The most recent data, however, has both production and non-production employment down—January production employment was down by 0.4% from December and non-production employment down by a relatively whopping 2.3%, likely the result of holiday slowdowns.

Publishing employment was down 0.7% from December 2024 to January 2025.

Looking at other business categories, the reporting of which lags a month:

Overall employment in the signage industry was up 1.6% from November to December, with sign production employment up 1.6% and non-production up 1.5%—quite the reversal from November when sign employment was generally down.

Converted paper products employment was up 2.1% from November to December, with paperboard container employment up 3.3% and paper bags and coated and treated paper employment up 0.7%.

Looking at some specific publishing and creative segments, from November to December, periodical publishing employment was up 0.6%, while newspaper publishing employment was—wow—up 4.4% and book publishing was down 0.2%. Graphic design employment was—yikes—down 7.6%, ad agency employment was also down 7.6%, and PR agency employment was down 1.3%. Direct mail advertising employment was up 4.2%.

As for January employment in general, the BLS reported on February 7:

Total nonfarm payroll employment rose by 143,000 in January, and the unemployment rate edged down to 4.0 percent, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported today. Job gains occurred in health care, retail trade, and social assistance. Employment declined in the mining, quarrying, and oil and gas extraction industry.

The U-6 rate (the so-called “real” unemployment rate which includes not just those currently unemployed but also those who are underemployed, marginally attached to the workforce, and have given up looking for work) was unchanged at 7.5%.

The labor force participation rate increased from 62.5% to 62.6% and the employment-to-population ratio increased from 60.0% to 60.1%. The labor force participation rate for 24–54-year-olds increased from 83.4% to 83.5%.  

The January report was  below economists’ expectations, even if November and December payrolls were revised up by 100,000.

We’re a month behind employment reporting; we’ll look at the February report in a couple of weeks.