Hawaii’s unemployment rate toward the end of 2022 actually was higher than previously reported.

Upward revisions undertaken by the federal Bureau of Labor Statistics boosted the rates for the last four months of 2022, including increasing December’s seasonally adjusted jobless rate by a half-percentage point, to 3.7% from 3.2%.

That meant January’s 3.6% unemployment rate actually was an improvement from the previous month, according to data released Friday by the state Department of Business, Economic Development and Tourism. But the numbers for September, October and November, as well as December, were worse than previously reported. September’s jobless rate went to 3.7% from 3.5%, October went to 3.7% from 3.3% and November went to 3.7% from 3.3%.

“The revised data showed that Hawaii unemployment rates during the last quarter of 2022 were higher than the preliminary estimates, and also were higher than the U.S. averages,” DBEDT chief economist Eugene Tian said. “This is mainly caused by the increase in the labor force.”

Tian said because more people joined the labor force in the fourth quarter, and the number of people employed remained flat, there were more people in the group of the unemployed, thus increasing the unemployment rate.

Still, he forecasts that the state’s unemployment rate will get better this year.

“Hawaii’s unemployment rate will improve in 2023 with the continued recovery of the economy,” Tian said. “DBEDT projects that the unemployment rate in 2023 will be 3.4%. The increasing interest rate by the Fed will have a negative impact on investment — especially construction — and real estate due to a higher borrowing rate, and thus will reduce the workforce in those industries.”

Tian said, though, given that government construction (federal, state and county) is going to be strong in 2023, the overall impact on the construction industry is not going to be very significant, though private construction is going to be slow.

“We will see the slowing down in real estate with sales decreasing, and also housing prices down,” Tian said.

The BLS numbers revision is an annual routine it conducts every March to make the labor data consistent with U.S. Census population data, because every year in December the Census Bureau releases new population estimates. In addition, the BLS changed industry classifications in 2022 and needed to reallocate the data to be consistent with the new classifications.

So BLS revised monthly labor statistics for labor force, employment, unemployment and the unemployment rate from January 1990 to December 2022, and revised the job count by industry from January 1990 to December 2022.

More specifically, the unemployment rates over 2022 were revised upward from September through December but revised lower from January to August.

Hawaii’s highest unemployment rate ever, previously reported as 22.4% in April 2020 at the outset of the pandemic, was revised lower to 18.8%. Hawaii’s all-time low was 1.6% in December 2019.

Nonfarm payroll jobs rose by 2,100 in January over December, with the leisure and hospitality sector gaining 4,300 positions to more than offset a loss of 2,600 jobs in federal, state and local government positions.

Hawaii’s labor force, which includes those who are employed, those who are unemployed but actively seeking work and those who are self- employed, fell to 679,050 in January from a revised 679,700 in December. Those employed dipped to 654,450 from a revised 654,500 in December. The number of people unemployed declined to 24,650 from a revised 25,200.

Nonfarm payroll jobs are calculated from a mail survey of employers and are considered a better indicator of job growth due to a larger sample size than the labor force data, which is compiled from a telephone survey of households. In the payroll count, one person might be counted multiple times if that person has multiple jobs.

The jobless rate fell in the state’s four major counties in December from November. State and national labor force data is adjusted for seasonal factors, but the county jobs data does not take into account variations such as the winter holiday and summer vacation seasons.

Honolulu County’s jobless rate fell to 3.1% from 3.4%, Hawaii County’s rate dropped to 3.4% from 3.8%, Kauai County’s rate decreased to 3.0% from 3.4% and Maui County’s rate sank to 3.1% from 3.3%. In Maui County, Maui’s rate fell to 3.1% from 3.3%, and Molokai’s rate dropped to 3.6% from 3.9%. Lanai’s rate rose to 2.1% from 1.1%.