Employment Falls Again

Chemical industry employment fell for the second straight month in June, according to seasonally adjusted data from the Labor Department. June employment totaled 892,800, down 1,400 from May and off 15,100 from June of last year. The number of chemical production workers also declined, falling by 800 between May and June to 519,600 and down 2,400 from June 2003. The average workweek declined to 42.5 hours from 42.9 hours in the previous month, but was up from 42.2 hours a year earlier. Thus, the government's index of aggregate workhours--a product of the number of production workers and the workweek--declined to 98.2 (2000 = 100) from 99.3 in May. This is the lowest level for the index since October 2003, when it was 97.6.