US transportation sector unemployment rate falls to 5.1% in October 2021, remains above pre-pandemic October 2019’s 2.7%

The unemployment rate in the U.S. transportation sector was 5.1 percent (not seasonally adjusted) in October 2021 according to recently updated Bureau of Labor Statistics data on the Bureau of Transportation Statistics (BTS) Unemployment in Transportation dashboard. The October 2021 rate was down 3.8 percentage points from October 2020’s 8.9 percent but remains 2.4 percentage points above the 2.7 percent rate in pre-pandemic October 2019. To date, the transportation unemployment rate peak during the COVID-19 pandemic is 15.7 percent set in both May and July 2020.

The overall U.S. unemployment rate in October was 4.6 percent (seasonally adjusted), down 2.3 percentage points from October 2020’s 6.9 percent but 1 percentage point above the pre-pandemic October 2019 overall rate of 3.6 percent. The overall U.S. unemployment rate during the pandemic peaked at 14.8 percent in April 2020.