Pres. Obama in Ohio this week. (photo by Pete Souza)
This is great news for Pres. Obama and most importantly, the country and people who have been struggling trying to find employment for months.
December was the sixth straight month that 100,000 jobs were added, the first time this has happened in six years. The job rate was also “broad based,” according to expert analysis by Moody’s.
Employment grew solidly last month and the jobless rate dropped to a near three-year low of 8.5 percent, offering the strongest evidence yet of an acceleration in economic activity.
Nonfarm payrolls increased 200,000 last month, the Labor Department said on Friday, the most in three months and way above economists’ expectations for a 150,000 gain.
The labor force, however, has shrunk, though one analyst from Moody’s wasn’t concerned about it.
One element is young women, which I wrote about this past week. For the first time in three decades, younger women are going back to tool up on education, which was reported by the New York Times just before the New Year.
Workers are dropping out of the labor force in droves, and they are mostly women. In fact, many are young women. But they are not dropping out forever; instead, these young women seem to be postponing their working lives to get more education. There are now — for the first time in three decades — more young women in school than in the work force.
As for what this could do to the Republican horse race. It should strengthen Rick Santorum and bolster conservatives. Because without the economy as message, Mitt Romney looks even weaker and lamer, though that’s hard to do.
This post has been updated.
212,000 private sector jobs added,12,000 public sector sector jobs lost. Smallest gains were in large corporations proving that large corporations are not job creators, they are job exporters, undermining Mittens entire campaign theme. Unemployment rate down to 8.5 lowest unemployment rate in three years. Sean Hannity, the Wall Street Journal, the RNC are already putting on their black arm bands and the analysts over at the Fox Business Channel looked like they were all struck by severe cases of hemorroids.
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the RNC are already putting on their black arm bands and the analysts over at the Fox Business Channel looked like they were all struck by severe cases of hemorroids (sic).
Oh, wait until right-wing radio weighs in! Rush Limbaugh was bad yesterday, but today he might even choose to have a guest host sit in.
This news also should strengthen Rick Santorum a bit, actually, which would be very good news for conservatives. Because without the economy, Mitt Romney’s “inevitability” disappears.
Just a quick drive by this morning….
Please do the numbers when talking about unemployment. If the size of the workforce was comparable to when the President took office in 2009 our unemployment rate today would be 11%. I tire of the games being played with peoples lives by not presenting the full picture.
hey- if it werent for cuts in teachers etc it would be even more jobs created! as long as there are pos. jobs reports in12 obama re elect gets a bit better and better. new poll this morning from ras. has romney and santorum near tied in SC. if conservatives want to stop mitt they gotta do it in SC. got to. that is why perry jumping back in has pissed off so many on the right- bc he will peel off conserva votes from santorum.
The gain in manufacturing jobs were the largest one month gain since 1999. That good news was attributted to increasing labor costs in China and elsewhere overseas and the increased shipping costs from importing manufactured goods from China and eslewhere as well as the extraordinary productivity of US workers:)
On the downside layoffs of public sector workers (Police, forefighters, teachers) continue at the state and local level. The improving economy is still threatend by what goes on in Europe, continued public sector worker layoffs and if the intrsansigence of the Republicans in the House and Senate willmight lead to a downgrade of the US credit ratings.
Come on Art you are smarter than this. I really don’t want to have to put up pages of numbers on unemployment, the types of jobs “created”, seasonal work, on and on.
And for me this isn’t about politics and Obama getting re-elected. It’s about human lives.
Happy New Year Kris. I’ve looked at reports & numbers. It remains weak, but reporting this fairly reveals exactly what I wrote.
Thanks for mentioning teachers, Art.
I’m out of my office right now, but you must see Santorum’s response on this! He says the economy got better because people are looking at Republicans taking back the White House!
You can’t make this stuff up.
Yes, well, they don’t work for laborers.
Dean Baker has a different take:
Real unemployment remains what it has been. That’s not going to change. People trumpeting this as some sort of wonderful news are smoking something I wish I could partake in. At least it would get me through the next few miserable years it’s going to take before enough people in the press and politics wake up and figure out what’s going on.
Let me see the archive comments from one year ago that said there would be no gradual recovery of private sector employment…………..such that this news is some great surprise.
As said above, when you take out holiday hires, the numbers are at expectation.
The gradual private sector recovery forecasts have long called for unemployment to be about 8.0 come election time. We’re right on trend. How that number plays in Peoria will determine if Romney loses to Obama or not.
Why this is significant to Republican prospects is it shows that when government is gridlocked, the economy can still improve. Gridlocked government is a half-decent approximation of the effects of more limited government. Secondly, it improved during a time there was no goverment stimulus whereas it hadn’t improved like this during the period of stimulus.
Take that Krugman……long live the Austrian School!