The government shutdown may be over, but don’t expect to see missing BLS data anytime soon

The Bureau of Labor Statistics’s November theme might as well be: Go girl, give us nothing!

The federal government began reopening on Thursday after a 43-day shutdown, the longest in history. The Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) was among the agencies that were mostly shuttered during that period, and as a result HR pros were without the valuable labor-market insights afforded to them by the monthly JOLTS and jobs report.

Unfortunately for HR pros, while the government is reopening, it seems some of that missed data may never see the light of day.

Missing data. On Wednesday, White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt told reporters during a press briefing that the October jobs data and consumer price index, which measures inflation, would likely never be released. Since many BLS operations were on hold during the shutdown, the surveys that the reports are based on were not conducted. The September jobs data, which was collected prior to the shutdown but never released, will likely be published next week, according to National Economic Council Director Kevin Hassett.

“With October CPI and jobs reports likely never being released, and all of that economic data released will be permanently impaired, leaving our policymakers at the Fed flying blind at a critical period,” Leavitt said.

On Thursday, Hassett said that an impartial October jobs report would likely be released. The data collected from employers for the jobs report, which assesses how many jobs were added by industry in a given month, will be published. The household survey, which counts metrics like the unemployment rate, was not conducted and would be left out of an October jobs report.

“The household survey wasn’t conducted in October, so we’re going to get half the employment report,” Hassett told Fox News. “We’ll get the jobs part, but we won’t get the unemployment rate, and that’ll just be for one month.”

A FAQ published by the Friends of the BLS—a bipartisan group focused on the agency’s well-being that’s co-led by former BLS commissioners Erica Groshen and Bill Beach—confirmed these interruptions.

“Because of the long shutdown, October 2025 will permanently remain a partial blind spot in America’s official record,” the FAQ answered on the site.

Zoom out. Disruptions to the BLS data collection will likely persist beyond October. While the Friends of BLS said the agency will publish an updated release schedule soon after the government reopens, it also noted that the “data quality and availability may suffer more” than that following past shutdowns because of the record length of the closure. The layoffs and attrition at the agency also mean there are now fewer staff members picking up the slack.

“Expect significant delays, some cancellations (perhaps temporary), preliminary and revised estimates, with guidance on data quality and uses. These effects could persist for many months,” the group wrote.

Policymakers and employers will likely have a “fog” around data until January, when the December jobs data is published, according to Daniel Zhao, Glassdoor’s chief economist. That will negatively impact their talent plans at a critical time, when they are strategizing for the year ahead.

“The lack of data makes it harder for businesses to make investment and hiring plans especially in the critical fourth quarter when many businesses are setting their plans for 2026,” Zhao said. “The increased uncertainty could put a damper on hiring plans early in the new year as businesses sit in a holding pattern until the economic trajectory comes into focus.”