The National Council on Compensation Insurance (NCCI) published the September 2026 edition of their labor market insights reports, offering a snapshot of current employment trends and their potential impact on workers’ compensation.

By highlighting workforce and economic trends, reports like these help stakeholders to understand how operational planning, pricing strategies, and risk management may be influenced in the near future.

Employment increased by an estimated 162,000 jobs in August. Combined with upward revisions of 11,000 for June and 44,000 for July, this report is a major reversal from the sluggish growth reported earlier in the summer and late spring. Employment growth was broad-based across industries, with declines only in the financial activities and information sectors. Leisure and hospitality had the largest growth of 62,000 jobs, bouncing back from declines in June and July. Government, health care, construction, and manufacturing also added substantial employment in August.

Average weekly hours ticked up in August along with employment. This led to a strong month for overall payroll growth despite hourly wage growth coming in at just 3.1% year over year, much closer to pre-pandemic norms than the elevated hourly growth seen in the last few years.

Employment growth in August came primarily from increased labor force participation rather than a decline in unemployment. The unemployment rate held steady at 4.1% as the labor force participation rate increased by 0.2 percentage points. Both rates are still slightly lower than they had been earlier in 2026.

Employment growth averaged 71,000 jobs (or 75,000 private jobs) from June through August combined, very close to the three-year average, with NCCI considering this a strong sign of a stabilizing market rather than as acceleration.