# US Labor Market Indicator Lookup — BLS Data (`m_ctim/us-labor-market-indicator-lookup`) Actor Look up national US labor market indicators (unemployment rate, CPI, average hourly earnings, labor force participation, job openings rate) over recent years via the official Bureau of Labor Statistics public API. For finance, macro, and policy research teams. - **URL**: https://apify.com/m\_ctim/us-labor-market-indicator-lookup.md - **Developed by:** [Timothy Kelvin](https://apify.com/m_ctim) (community) - **Categories:** Business - **Stats:** 2 total users, 1 monthly users, 100.0% runs succeeded, 0 bookmarks - **User rating**: No ratings yet ## Pricing Pay per usage This Actor is paid per platform usage. The Actor is free to use, and you only pay for the Apify platform usage, which gets cheaper the higher subscription plan you have. Learn more: https://docs.apify.com/actors/running/actors-in-store.md#pay-per-usage ## What's an Apify Actor? Actors are web data automations that power AI and operations. They run on the Apify platform to scrape websites, process data, connect APIs, and automate workflows. In Batch mode, an Actor accepts a well-defined JSON input, performs an action which can take anything from a few seconds to a few hours, and optionally produces a well-defined JSON output, datasets with results, or files in key-value store. In Standby mode, an Actor provides a web server which can be used as a website, API, or an MCP server. Actors are written with capital "A". ## How to integrate an Actor? If asked about integration, you help developers integrate Actors into their projects. You adapt to their stack and deliver integrations that are safe, well-documented, and production-ready. The best way to integrate Actors is as follows. - **AI agents and MCP clients** — the [Apify MCP server](https://docs.apify.com/integrations/mcp.md) at `https://mcp.apify.com` (remote, streamable HTTP, OAuth on first use). - **Agentic workflows and local Actor development** — [Agent Skills](https://apify.com/.well-known/agent-skills/index.json) with the [Apify CLI](https://docs.apify.com/cli/docs.md): `npm install -g apify-cli`, then `apify login`. - **JavaScript/TypeScript projects** — the official [JS/TS client](https://docs.apify.com/api/client/js/docs.md): `npm install apify-client`. - **Python projects** — the official [Python client](https://docs.apify.com/api/client/python/docs.md): `pip install apify-client`. - **Any other language** — the [REST API](https://docs.apify.com/api/v2.md). For usage examples, see the [API](#api) section below. For more details, see Apify documentation as [Markdown index](https://docs.apify.com/llms.txt) and [Markdown full-text](https://docs.apify.com/llms-full.txt). # README ## US Labor Market Indicator Lookup — BLS Data Look up national US labor market indicators — unemployment rate, CPI, average hourly earnings, labor force participation, job openings rate — over recent years, via the official [Bureau of Labor Statistics public API](https://www.bls.gov/developers/). Built for finance, macro, and policy research teams tracking the US labor market trend without pulling BLS's own CSV/Excel releases by hand. ### Input ```json { "indicators": ["unemploymentRate", "cpi", "averageHourlyEarnings"], "yearsBack": 3 } ``` | Field | Type | Description | |---|---|---| | `indicators` | array of strings | Which indicators to fetch. One or more of `unemploymentRate`, `cpi`, `averageHourlyEarnings`, `laborForceParticipationRate`, `jobOpeningsRate`. Default `["unemploymentRate"]`. | | `yearsBack` | number | How many years of monthly history to fetch per indicator. Default `3`, max `20`. | ### Output One record per requested indicator, with its full monthly history and a year-over-year comparison: ```json { "indicator": "unemploymentRate", "label": "Unemployment rate", "unit": "percent", "seriesId": "LNS14000000", "latestValue": 4.1, "latestPeriod": "July 2026", "yearOverYearChange": -0.2, "yearOverYearPercentChange": -4.65, "history": [ { "year": "2026", "period": "M07", "periodName": "July", "value": 4.1 } ] } ``` An unrecognized indicator key is skipped with a warning rather than failing the whole run. ### How it works Direct calls to the official [BLS public API](https://www.bls.gov/developers/) (`api.bls.gov/publicAPI/v2`) — no proxy, no scraping, no API key required for this actor's usage level. BLS is a federal statistical agency; its published data is US government work and in the public domain. This actor covers a curated set of well-known national series rather than arbitrary series-ID lookup, since BLS has no key-free series search endpoint. ### Pricing note Billed per **lookup** (one run), not per indicator returned — one charge whether you request 1 indicator or all 5. ### Related products - [Economic Indicator Lookup](https://github.com/timmKal01/economic-indicator-lookup) — the World Bank international-economics counterpart to this US-specific labor data - [US National Debt Tracker](https://github.com/timmKal01/us-national-debt-tracker) — daily US fiscal data from the same government-data family # Actor input Schema ## `indicators` (type: `array`): Which national labor market indicators to fetch. Leave as default for just the unemployment rate. ## `yearsBack` (type: `integer`): How many years of monthly history to fetch per indicator, most recent first. ## Actor input object example ```json { "indicators": [ "unemploymentRate" ], "yearsBack": 3 } ``` # Actor output Schema ## `results` (type: `string`): No description # API You can run this Actor programmatically using our API. Below are code examples in JavaScript, Python, and CLI, as well as the OpenAPI specification and MCP server setup. ## JavaScript example ```javascript import { ApifyClient } from 'apify-client'; // Initialize the ApifyClient with your Apify API token // Replace the '' with your token const client = new ApifyClient({ token: '', }); // Prepare Actor input const input = { "indicators": [ "unemploymentRate" ] }; // Run the Actor and wait for it to finish const run = await client.actor("m_ctim/us-labor-market-indicator-lookup").call(input); // Fetch and print Actor results from the run's dataset (if any) console.log('Results from dataset'); console.log(`💾 Check your data here: https://console.apify.com/storage/datasets/${run.defaultDatasetId}`); const { items } = await client.dataset(run.defaultDatasetId).listItems(); items.forEach((item) => { console.dir(item); }); // 📚 Want to learn more 📖? Go to → https://docs.apify.com/api/client/js/docs ``` ## Python example ```python from apify_client import ApifyClient # Initialize the ApifyClient with your Apify API token # Replace '' with your token. client = ApifyClient("") # Prepare the Actor input run_input = { "indicators": ["unemploymentRate"] } # Run the Actor and wait for it to finish run = client.actor("m_ctim/us-labor-market-indicator-lookup").call(run_input=run_input) # Fetch and print Actor results from the run's dataset (if there are any) print(f"💾 Check your data here: https://console.apify.com/storage/datasets/{run.default_dataset_id}") for item in client.dataset(run.default_dataset_id).iterate_items(): print(item) # 📚 Want to learn more 📖? Go to → https://docs.apify.com/api/client/python/docs/quick-start ``` ## CLI example ```bash echo '{ "indicators": [ "unemploymentRate" ] }' | apify call m_ctim/us-labor-market-indicator-lookup --silent --output-dataset ``` ## MCP server setup ```json { "mcpServers": { "apify": { "type": "http", "url": "https://mcp.apify.com/?tools=fetch-actor-details,m_ctim/us-labor-market-indicator-lookup" } } } ``` The hosted server signs you in with OAuth on first connect, so no API token belongs in this config. Clients without OAuth support can send an `Authorization: Bearer ` header instead, using a token from API & Integrations in Apify Console (https://console.apify.com/settings/integrations). ## OpenAPI specification Download the OpenAPI definition: https://api.apify.com/v2/actors/Gw0K8RT05Qye8jwSO/builds/ey2Za3wqIa4L2RuaR/openapi.json