Some good news on the job front came in recently, are we in for an upturn after all? Well tough to say for sure now since the unemployment rate hangs on around 9.7%, but after this deep recession any good news is welcoming, let’s hope it is as strong and remains positive as the numbers say here.
The U.S. economy gained more jobs in March than any other month in the last three years, according to a government report released Friday.
The Labor Department said the economy gained 162,000 jobs in the month, compared to a revised reading of a 14,000 job loss in February. That makes March only the third month of gains since the recession began.
Economists surveyed by Briefing.com had forecast a gain of 184,000 jobs. But despite missing forecasts, the March number was generally not seen as a disappointment by economists, because revisions in January and February readings added a combined 62,000 additional jobs.
The unemployment rate remained stubbornly high, holding steady at 9.7%, matching economist expectations.
Among the major worker groups, the unemployment rates for adult men (10.0 per-cent), adult women (8.0 percent), teenagers (26.1 percent), whites (8.8 per-cent), blacks (16.5 percent), and Hispanics (12.6 percent) showed little or no change in March. The jobless rate for Asians was 7.5 percent, not seasonally adjusted.
The number of long-term unemployed (those jobless for 27 weeks and over) increased by 414,000 over the month to 6.5 million. In March, 44.1 percent of unemployed persons were jobless for 27 weeks or more.
The civilian labor force participation rate (64.9 percent) and the employment-population ratio (58.6 percent) continued to edge up in March.
The number of persons working part time for economic reasons (sometimes referred to as involuntary part-time workers) increased to 9.1 million in March. These individuals were working part time because their hours had been cut back or because they were unable to find a full-time job.
About 2.3 million persons were marginally attached to the labor force in March, compared with 2.1 million a year earlier. (The data are not seasonally adjusted.)
These individuals were not in the labor force, wanted and were available for work, and had looked for a job sometime in the prior 12 months. They were not counted as unemployed because they had not searched for work in the 4 weeks preceding the survey.