Download This Week’s Full Edition!

With federal employment data sources dark during the government shutdown, estimates from ADP and Revelio suggest modest September payroll gains of roughly 38,000, consistent with the sluggish but stable hiring trend.

What Caught Our Eyes This Week

Filling the Shutdown Data Gap

With government agencies temporarily out of commission, alternative sources of economic data have been thrust into the limelight. Two such sources for labor markets are ADP and RevelioLabs. Each covers much smaller samples sizes than the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) and can paint a very different picture from month to month. And yes, each is also subject to revisions. But with the lights out at the BLS, beggars can’t be choosers. For September, ADP reported negative payroll gains of -32,000, while Revelio’sdata looked a bit better at +60,000. According to Revelio, its own data is slightly more correlated to BLS data (0.74) than ADP’s data (0.71). Taken together, regression analysis suggests the BLS will ultimately show payroll gains of 38,000 for September. This number would be consistent with the recent trend of a sluggish but steady employment picture.

CHART OF THE WEEK: ADP, Revelio Labs, Bureau of Labor Statistics, Cerity Partners, September 2025

Past performance does not guarantee future results.

Please read important disclosures here.