Dallas Fed: Texas employment forecast strengthens; 41,200 jobs added in May

June 16, 2023

DALLAS—The Texas Employment Forecast released today by the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas indicates that jobs will increase 2.8 percent in 2023, with an 80 percent confidence band of 2.2 to 3.3 percent.

This is up from the previous month’s forecast of 2.6 percent growth for the year.

The forecast is based on an average of four models that include projected national GDP, oil futures prices, and the Texas and U.S. leading indexes.

Texas added 41,200 jobs in May, according to seasonally adjusted and benchmarked payroll employment numbers.

Texas added a downwardly revised 28,700 jobs in April.

“Despite economic headwinds, strong employment growth continued in May as the state added close to 41,200 jobs,” said Luis Torres, Dallas Fed senior business economist. “Texas job growth is a solid 3.6 percent year to date as the labor market continues to defy expectations of slowing. Strength in May was led by a surge in energy sector employment and by increases in professional and business services and health care services jobs.  Leisure and hospitality and manufacturing were the only two sectors to report job losses.”

Additional key takeaways from the latest Dallas Fed report:

• The forecast suggests that 376,800 jobs will be added in the state this year, and employment in December 2023 will be 14.0 million. 
• Texas employment grew a robust 3.6 percent month over month in May, while April growth was slightly revised down to 2.5 percent.

The unemployment rate increased in most of Texas’ major metro areas, including Dallas–Plano–Irving, San Antonio–New Braunfels, Houston–The Woodlands–Sugar Land, Austin–Round Rock, El Paso, Fort Worth–Arlington, Laredo, Brownsville–Harlingen and McAllen–Edinburg–Mission, according to seasonally adjusted numbers from the Dallas Fed.

The Texas unemployment rate was 4.1 percent in May, up from 4.0 percent in April.

Additional information about the Texas Employment Forecast, plus seasonally adjusted and benchmarked Texas jobs data and metro unemployment rates, may be found on DallasFed.org.

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Media contact:
Jon Prior
Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas
Phone: 214-922-6857
Email: jon.prior@dal.frb.org