Hoosier employers continued to augment their workforces for the 10th consecutive month and as a result, Indiana gained 7,200 private sector jobs.

The rate of job growth in Indiana for August tripled the national average (0.3 percent versus 0.1 percent). Since July 2009, the low point of employment, Indiana has added more than 150,000 private sector jobs and continues to significantly outpace the national rate of growth during this period (6.5 percent versus 3.5 percent).

The most significant gains in August came from Private Educational and Health Services (5,200 jobs added) and Construction (2,200 jobs added). For the third month in a row Indiana received data from the U.S. Department of Labor’s Bureau of Labor Statistics showing considerable discrepancies between the two measures of job growth and employment.

According to the Local Area Unemployment Statistics data, which is derived from a federal government phone survey of 1,000 households in Indiana, over 66,000 Hoosiers have gone from gainfully employed to no longer in the labor force over the span of 3 months. This is considerably more than neighboring states. During this same period, the federal government’s measure of payroll data, the Current Employment Statistics survey, shows Indiana private sector jobs increased by more than 11,000.

“Yet another month the federal government has notified us our unemployment rate increased while we added actual jobs” said Scott B. Sanders, Commissioner of the Department of Workforce Development. “We have repeatedly questioned their data models. It’s pretty obvious the numbers just don’t add up.” Sanders also noted that while Indiana’s unemployment rate increased 0.1 percent to 8.3 percent in August, Indiana is still significantly outperforming the U.S. average for private sector job growth (1.9 percent versus 1.1 percent), manufacturing growth (3.0 percent versus 1.4 percent) and nearly every other employment sector in 2012.