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Econwatch
June 4, 2010 11:32 AM

May Jobs: A Terrible Report

By
Jill Schlesinger
Topics
Employment

This post by Jill Schlesinger originally appeared on CBS' MoneyWatch.com.

(Credit: CBS/iStockphoto)
As I stood on the set of CNN American Morning, I was nearly speechless as Christine Romans scribbled down the Bureau of Labor Statistics results for last month. The May Jobs report was terrible. Yes, there were 431,000 new jobs created, but don't fall for this head fake. Of the jobs created, a whopping 411,000 were census workers hired on a temporary basis by Uncle Sam.

Let's put that into perspective: the U.S. economy needs to add something in the neighborhood of 125,000 jobs each month just to keep pace with new entrants to the work force and analysts believe that it will take a bunch of 250,000+ jobs a month to really put a dent in the unemployment rate. This was a terrible report.

Adding to the concern: those census workers who were happy to find income even on a temporary basis, will be let go in the coming months. In fact starting in June, the impact of the Census on the payroll report will be negative.

The other area that is worrisome is the stubbornly high number of long-term unemployed. There are 6.8 million people who have been out of work for more than 27 weeks, which constitutes 46% of the 15 million total unemployed. Did I mention that this was a terrible report?

I could find only two bright spots: the unemployment rate dropped to 9.7% from 9.9%, reflecting the departure of 322,000 from the labor force (not the greatest reason to see the rate drop) and the underemployment rate (including part-time and marginally attached workers) fell to 16.6% from 17.1%.

Here's a quick snapshot of the May jobs report:

  • Jobs added: 431,000
  • Census jobs: 411,000
  • Unemployment rate = 9.7% (from 9.9%)
  • Under-employment rate= 16.5%
  • Long-term (>27 weeks) = 6.8Ml, or 46% of unemployed
  • Avg work week=34.2 hours
  • Avg Hourly earnings=$22.57 (up paltry 1.9% in last 12 months)
  • Manufacturing: +29K
  • Construction: -35,000 (reversing the recent uptrend)
  • Temp: +31,000 (up 362K since 09/09)
  • Health Care: +8,000 (average has been +20K for past year, so this is a weak month)
  • April increase of 290,000 not revised, but March revised down to +208K from +230K

One last thing-since we are in the middle of graduation season, I note with some sadness that the unemployment rate for college graduates under the age of 25 has doubled to around 8% since the recession began. Still, it definitely pays off to attend some form of schooling after high school-the unemployment rate for high school graduates under age 25 who did not enroll in college was nearly 25%!

(CBS)

Jill Schlesinger is the Editor-at-Large for CBS MoneyWatch.com. Prior to the launch of MoneyWatch, she was the Chief Investment Officer for an independent investment advisory firm. In her infancy, she was an options trader on the Commodities Exchange of New York.



  • Jill Schlesinger

    >> View all articles

    Jill Schlesinger, CFP®, is the Editor-at-Large for CBS MoneyWatch. She covers the economy, markets, investing or anything else with a dollar sign. Prior to the launch of MoneyWatch in 2009, Jill was the chief investment officer for an independent investment advisory firm. In her infancy, she was an options trader on the Commodities Exchange of New York.

Add a Comment See all 23 Comments
by NewzMedia June 3, 2011 10:46 AM EDT
Employers Added 54K Jobs, Rate Ticks Up to 9.1:http://www.tekbuz.com/employers-added-54k-jobs-rate-ticks-up-to-9-1/89309
Reply to this comment
by wyodutch June 5, 2010 9:16 AM EDT
Wait a minute.. wait a minute! Something doesn't add up here.
.
The article claims we have a 9.7% unemployment rate here in the Empire. Israel, on the other hand, has a much lower (7.2%) unemployment figure.
.
Why would Obama and the politicians give Israel $3,200,000,000 in aid again this year if their economy is better than ours?
.
That would make no sense... would it?
Reply to this comment
by jgg000101 June 4, 2010 7:37 PM EDT
geez, CBS, you sure did bury this story, and funny that the Obama "Hails" Jobs report story is nowhere to be found.
Reply to this comment
by drushsean June 4, 2010 4:39 PM EDT
Hey Libs, how's all that hope and change working for ya? Got plenty of gas in the ol tank? Been a while since you made a house payment? Everyone capped on conservatives for not knowing how to run a country. Obama, and his super 'intelligent' elites would lower the sea levels and through their magnanamous personalities stop all the evil in the world. They would transform America. Well, how do you libs like the result?
Reply to this comment
by IndepTex20 June 4, 2010 3:58 PM EDT
by jgg000101 June 4, 2010 3:34 PM EDT
every number this administration submits - to great fanfare - is revised downward at a later date. Where's the story on the new CBO score of the healthcare bill that shows all of obama's claims and promises to be completely out of whack? Where's the report on the census employment numbers being manipulated and inflated? Where's the story of the illegal immigrant who raped an 8 yo arizona girl? Where's the story on obama's half brother, Samson, who was refused entry into the UK because of a rape charge and is now coming to the US? Where's the story of obama approving a new offshore oil well in Louisiana?

LOL...........not on the MSM that's for sure.

Here's a good source
<http://www.realclearpolitics.com/>

Here's a great article from that site
<http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0610/38089.html>
Reply to this comment
by nanc12 June 4, 2010 4:26 PM EDT
Gee, just ask Glen Beck where the stories are. He claimed on his show that Faux News was the ONLY network to show footage of the Israeli commandos getting hit with bats. The ONLY one, he cried, WHY IS THAT? Of course, MSNBC, CNN, Public TV, and even John Stewart had shown the footage 24 hours before cry-baby Beck showed it. But of course, that doesn't matter, Fox is fair and balanced. Just like when they showed footage of the President addressing cadets and West Point and editted out the applause. You neocons are such hypocrites.
by dadirt June 4, 2010 3:18 PM EDT
Thank you Jill for not pulling the Obama party line. It is refreshing to see the mainstream media actually not defending the spin. Eventally the libs will come to their senses when we are in another recession, and they unemployment runs out of money along with medicare, medicade and social security. The government doesn't create jobs, business does, and this president hates business. We would not have to share the wealth if the bums would get off their fat lazy butts and get and education, keep a family unit going, and discipline their kids. Until family units are brought back, our money sucking everyting free from the government is going to grow. More than 50% of the US population take more from teh government than they pay in. I think the wealth is allready being spread, and this clown wants more. All this to get votes! It might be time to spay and neuter people.
Reply to this comment
by jgg000101 June 4, 2010 3:18 PM EDT
Why has CBS buried the story on Obama "hailing" this jobs info as "good news".
Reply to this comment
by wfw3536 June 4, 2010 2:03 PM EDT
Where are all the jobs Obama promised with the stimilus bill of 870 billion. I guess the only jobs he can come up with are temporary census worker jobs which represented 400,000 jobs. How sad the Obama administration has wasted all this money and now they want to spend billions more on a new jobs bill. This administration does not have a clue as to what to do.
Reply to this comment
by jimmyc1955 June 4, 2010 3:27 PM EDT
Oh wait - he saved jobs!! Yea - that's it!! See you can claim you saved jobs but it is impossible to prove right or wrong so you can claim all the job savings you want and you can't be proved wrong!!

OF course since the $870 Billion as for cronies, unions, buddies and pals it's no surprise there was no stimulus bill. This was Chicago politics at it's best. Pay off your cronies using the public's money, promise more, deliver less, raise taxes, pay off more cronies - its how it's done in Chicago.
by larry0304 June 4, 2010 1:43 PM EDT
omega42- I already explained what needed to be done from the beginning. The fact is this liberal economic agenda has been tried before and it has NEVER WORKED IN ANY COUNTRY EVER! All the European countries did the EXACT same thing years ago and look where they are now. Printing money and taking care of illegals and minorities only works when there are enough jobs for taxes to pay for those social programs. We have the HIGHEST deficit and unemployment ever, and not under the evil Bush, but under Obama! Ya know, there comes a time when regardless of your ideology, you have to man up and admit mistakes. Obama was a mistake. He was an over-reaction to Bush and now unless good and decent people start speaking up, we are going to be in some serious SHI$!

You people have to stop playing the Bush card. That was good for the first 6 months but that no longer works. We are almost starting year 3 of Obama and we are no better off. Record deficit, record unemployment and a whole lot of anger out in main-stream America. Bush was a disaster, we all know that, but you have to understand why. Bush and all those Ivy league morons could'nt understand that country building is expensive and will eventually drain the host country. History teaches us, invade destroy and then get the hel$ out.

And for the record, I am not a republican. I'm an independent that leans to the right like the majority of Americans are. I believe the majority of politicians are crooks who's number one goal is to better his or her life before worrying about the people of this nation. What really pis$es me off more than anything is hypocrisy and I've had a belly-full from the liberal left.

Bush was persecuted for not moving quick enough in a natural disaster and the liberals were out in full force. Now THEIR guy has a disaster and again we all know he moved slowly. C'mon, partying at the white house with the Hollywood left is more important than those poor souls down in the gulf? Yet the left is strangely quiet. THAT my friend is HYPOCRISY!

This other garbage you Obamaites keep throwing out about how the republicans are controlled by the wealthy. Well, just how much is Pelosi worth? And if you wanna talk about the rich controlling a party, take a long hard look at George Soros and what HIS agenda is. Do you believe it's a coincidence that all the things this evil bastar$ has talked about wanting years ago is now this administrations policies? Again more HYPOCRISY. I'm fed up with all the political garbage because real Americans are losing jobs and homes and no one in power gives a dam$!
Reply to this comment
by omega42 June 4, 2010 1:48 PM EDT
Larry, larry, larry, my argument was that the Republican BS of taxcuts growing jobs was tried and failed under Bush... from the WSJ

By WSJ Staff

President George W. Bush entered office in 2001 just as a recession was starting, and is preparing to leave in the middle of a long one. That?s almost 22 months of recession during his 96 months in office.

His job-creation record won?t look much better. The Bush administration created about three million jobs (net) over its eight years, a fraction of the 23 million jobs created under President Bill Clinton?s administration and only slightly better than President George H.W. Bush did in his four years in office.

Here?s a look at job creation under each president since the Labor Department started keeping payroll records in 1939. The counts are based on total payrolls between the start of the month the president took office (using the final payroll count for the end of the prior December) and his final December in office.

Because the size of the economy and labor force varies, we also calculate in percentage terms how much the total payroll count expanded under each president. The current President Bush, once taking account how long he?s been in office, shows the worst track record for job creation since the government began keeping records.

So again....We're globalized now. Your antiquated notions of taxcuts have been tried and failed... What are you proposing now Larry?
by omega42 June 4, 2010 1:51 PM EDT
BTW larry, Airbus, BMW, Mercedes, VW all are in the European system of higher taxes and regulations that you are decrying yet none of them seem to be fairing any worse than their American counterparts. Larry, France and Germany actually have lower unemployment rates than the US.
by rainbowroosie June 4, 2010 1:35 PM EDT
It's the economy stupid -- two years and you've accomplished NOTHING. Worse, you've spent a generation's worth of tax dollars to bail out failures --- similar effort on the oil crisis and health care --- time to fire some of you inept staff....
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