Governor's office touts 1.3% annual job growth, while federal data show a monthly decline and unemployment holding at 4.7%

Damien Willis, Organ Mountain News

SANTA FE - New Mexico added 11,200 payroll jobs over the past year, outpacing national employment growth, although federal figures also show the state lost jobs during September and its unemployment rate remained higher than a year earlier.

According to a news release issued Friday, Oct. 23, by Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham's office, New Mexico's employment grew 1.3% over the 12 months ending in September, compared with a national growth rate of 0.3%. The administration said the state ranked seventh nationally for annual job growth.

But seasonally adjusted employment figures published by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics and analyzed by Congress' Joint Economic Committee show New Mexico lost approximately 800 payroll jobs between August and September, after adding 3,200 jobs the previous month.

The state's seasonally adjusted unemployment rate held at 4.7% in September, up from 4.2% a year earlier.

The figures reflect different measurements. The governor's office cited unadjusted year-over-year payroll employment, while the Joint Economic Committee used seasonally adjusted data that account for recurring employment patterns. Its analysis showed New Mexico gained 11,900 jobs over 12 months, even as employment declined during September.

Construction and health care lead annual gains

According to the governor's office, private-sector employers added 8,400 jobs over the year, with seven of nine major private industry categories recording employment gains.

Health care and social assistance added 3,700 jobs, an increase of 2.8%. Construction employment grew by 2,800 jobs, or 5.1%, while mining added 1,400 jobs and manufacturing gained 600.

Retail trade employment increased by 2,200 jobs, or 2.3%, and wholesale trade grew 3.3%.

Government employment presented a mixed picture. The administration reported that federal government employment in New Mexico declined by 2,000 jobs, or 7%, while local government employment increased by 4,200 jobs, including 2,700 in local education.

The governor's office said New Mexico's annual growth rate trailed Nevada and Utah, which each recorded 1.4%, but exceeded the rates reported for Texas, California, Arizona, Oklahoma, Colorado and Wyoming.

Governor credits economic diversification

Lujan Grisham attributed the employment gains to growth in construction, manufacturing and health care, arguing that investments in those industries have helped the state withstand broader economic pressures.

“While high costs and tepid job growth squeeze families across the country, New Mexico is charging straight into those headwinds, and we're gaining ground,” Lujan Grisham said in Friday's release.

New Mexico Workforce Solutions Secretary Sarita Nair also cited economic diversification, particularly as federal government employment continues to decline.

“Despite continued instability in the federal workforce, these numbers show that our efforts to diversify New Mexico's economy are working,” Nair said.

The employment figures document growth in several industries but do not, by themselves, establish how much of that growth resulted from specific state economic development policies.

Monthly figures offer a more complicated picture

The Joint Economic Committee's analysis, based on Bureau of Labor Statistics data released Oct. 20, shows that New Mexico's private sector lost approximately 200 jobs during September.

Construction added 1,000 jobs during the month, while private education and health services lost 700 and the trade, transportation and utilities sector lost another 700.

The analysis also found that New Mexico's labor force participation rate declined from 56.7% in August to 56.6% in September. The rate measures the share of people age 16 and older who are employed or actively seeking work.

Over the past year, the participation rate fell by 0.9 percentage points, according to the committee's report.

Those figures provide additional context for the state's annual job gains: Payroll employment remained above year-earlier levels, but fewer New Mexicans were participating in the labor force, and the unemployment rate was higher than in September 2025.

The latest figures are preliminary and subject to revision.

The underlying statistics are available through the Bureau of Labor Statistics' New Mexico employment summary and the Joint Economic Committee's September 2026 state employment analysis.

Damien Willis is founder and editor of Organ Mountain News. If you have a personal story to share or a lead we should follow up on, reach out at OrganMountainNews@gmail.com or connect with him on X at @damienwillis.