Virginia added 8,600 nonfarm jobs in November, according to preliminary estimates from the Bureau of Labor Statistics’ Current Employment Statistics survey, Gov. Glenn Youngkin recently announced. The state’s seasonally adjusted unemployment rate held steady at 3.5 percent, 1.1 percentage points below the national rate.
Since January 2022, nonfarm payroll employment in the commonwealth has increased by 264,000 jobs.
“Though delayed, the November jobs report includes an anticipated shift from government-focused employment to the Commonwealth’s robust and growing private sector,” Youngkin said. “A broad-based swath of businesses across the Commonwealth filled more than a quarter of a million jobs since our administration began, not including the current 255,000 open and available jobs and the more than 80,000 permanent and 40,000 construction jobs that are still to come from the record economic development commitments we’ve seen over the past four years.”
According to preliminary data from the BLS Local Area Unemployment Statistics program, also known as the household survey, Virginia’s labor force decreased by 12,851 from September to 4,527,441. During that period, the number of unemployed residents declined by 689 to 159,510, while the number of employed residents decreased by 12,162 to 4,367,931.
Over-the-month comparisons are unavailable because the Bureau of Labor Statistics did not collect household survey data in October 2025 due to the federal government shutdown.
The commonwealth’s labor force participation rate fell 0.3 percentage points from September to 64.3 percent in November. The labor force participation rate measures the proportion of the civilian population age 16 and older who are employed or actively seeking work.
The CES survey uses payroll records from establishment employers to count jobs for which employers pay unemployment insurance. The LAUS household survey is based on monthly interviews conducted for the Bureau of Labor Statistics and provides broader labor force data, including employment and unemployment status.
Establishment survey data reflect updates for seasonal adjustment factors and industry classification conversions as part of the annual benchmarking process.
The household survey distinguishes whether an individual is employed or unemployed, while the CES survey counts each employee on an employer’s payroll. CES excludes business owners, self-employed individuals, unpaid volunteers, private household workers, and those on unpaid leave or not working because of a labor dispute.
The BLS did not publish October 2025 state employment and unemployment data. Establishment survey data for October 2025 were released alongside November 2025 figures, while household survey data for October were not collected due to a lapse in federal appropriations and will not be collected retroactively.
