Please Don't Be Satisfied With This Jobs Report

[xchrom]

http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2013/07/please-dont-be-satisfied-with-this-jobs-report/277547/

Another month, another jobs report that's good, but not quite good enough.

Employers beat expectations in June by adding 195,000 new workers to their payrolls. Thanks to the government's data revisions, we know they added 195,000 in May as well, and 199,000 in April (as shown in the Washington Post graph below). Over the past year, we've averaged 191,000 per month. Over the past 6 months, we've averaged 202,000. We're nothing if not consistent.

Which means we've still got a long slog ahead.


Unemployment is still hovering at 7.6 percent, unchanged this month thanks to an influx of new workers into the labor force. Brookings projects that we'll still be above 7 percent by the end of the year. Meanwhile, there are still 2 million fewer workers on U.S. payrolls than at our pre-crash peak. If you assume we'll keep adding jobs at our 6-month average pace, we're looking at 10 to 11 months before we get back to where things were before the market fell apart.

[greytdemocrat]

1. This stat is more troubling..

"The government's broadest underemployment measure , known as U-6, jumped from 13.8 percent to 14.3 percent, thanks a huge leap in the number of employees working part time because they couldn't find full-time work."

[tridim]

2. I'm happy and optimistic about the trend in the right direction.

And since last year I'm getting lots of cold call job offers again, first time since the IT bubble burst in 1999. I'm very happy about that. It's definitely a positive data point.

But yes, it's not enough because the Republicans have BLOCKED all Democratic efforts to create jobs. I'm never satisfied with those assholes.

[byeya]

3. If the Repubies had allowed a meaningful fidcal stimulus package we'd see better figures and less

misery in the land. The fiscal stimunlus that did go through was effective for the most part.

The % of participation in the workforce is very low by historic standards so when the economy contiues to improve, more of these people will reenter the workforce and the rate of unemployment will stay high for a period of time. It's important to look at the total number of people employed.

It's disturbing that many of the jobs created were temp jobs and jobs in the hospitality sector which are low paying in the main. Manufacturing continues to be in recession.

The wage earner is not seeing any return on his/her increased productivity which is what our system of monopoly capitalism wants but is not what workers want. We're still losing and don't seem to have a forceful advocate in the White House.

On the whole, counting the previous months upward revision, it's an OK report going in the right direction, imo.