The US economy added 171,000 for the month of October. This number is just above the rate needed to keep up with population. It’s not bad, but it’s not awesome either. But reality will not matter. The media will crow the economy is booming and all is well in the world.
American job creation improved in October with 171,000 new jobs but the unemployment rate moved higher to 7.9 percent, setting the stage for a final push to the finish line in the heated presidential campaign.
Economists had been expecting the report to show a net of 125,000 new jobs and a steadying of the unemployment rate at 7.8 percent. Nomura Securities predicted the rate would fall to 7.7 percent, but most expected no change.
Most of the job creation came in the services sector, with a gain of 150,000, while government employment rolls saw a collective decrease of 13,000, according to the report from the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
[….]
aken comprehensively, the report was better than expected but still representative of tepid growth that is doing little to generate escape velocity for the slow-moving economy.
“You’re still seeing that gap of a relay race in the economy where the consumer’s feeling a little bit better…but the corporate sector is not as strong,” Diane Swonk, economist at Mesirow Financial in Chicago, told CNBC. “They’re not hiring out like crazy, but certainly you’ve got to welcome these kinds of numbers.
There is another factor about this report, hourly wages
One of the negative features of the current economic recovery has been declining incomes of average Americans.
This trend continued in October.
The Labor Department reported Friday that despite 171,000 jobs being added to nonfarm payrolls in October, average hourly earnings for such employees edged down by 1 cent to $23.58.
Average hourly earnings of private-sector production and nonsupervisory employees also dropped by 1 cent to $19.79.
This continues a trend reported by the Census Bureau in August finding that since the recovery began in June 2009, median household incomes have fallen 4.8 percent adjusted for inflation.
