Modest Growth in Jobs Seen in Final Report Before Election

New York Times ^ | November 2, 2012 | By CATHERINE RAMPELL

[Oldeconomybuyer]

In the last assessment of the job market before the presidential election, the Labor Department announced Friday that the nation’s employers had added 171,000 positions in October, as well as more jobs than initially estimated in both August and September.

The latest figures are probably good news for President Obama, as there was widespread suspicion that the previous month’s large drop in the unemployment rate — below 8 percent for the first time since he took office — might have been a statistical fluke.

Even so, the numbers arrived somewhat late in the game to have a huge impact on the election.

“Federal unemployment benefits are one of the most effective stimuli we have,” said Christine L. Owens, the executive director of the National Employment Law Project, a liberal research and advocacy organization that focuses on labor issues.

“The recovery is still fragile,” she said, “and to pull that amount of income and expenditure out of the economy — particularly at a time when people thinking about the holiday season — will have a significant impact on not just those individuals and their families but the economy as a whole.”

[dalebert]

that figure is so low it could be considered no growth...just like no intrest on our worthless dollar

[LoneStarGI]

Typical spin from the Slimes. They sight the 171k jobs added number and say it is a modest increase. Yet they conveniently left out any mention of the 170k people who filed new unemployment claims, essentially neutralizing any economic gains.

[DoughtyOne]

It goes beyond that. It takes more than 170k new jobs each month for the labor force to keep up with new workers being introduced to the work force.

A figure of 170k new jobs is essentially a figure that reveals there are even more potential workers out of work, at the end of the month, then there were at the beginning of the month.

Obama has us in a hole, and he’s still digging...

A publication of value would explain this to the public.

Instead the Times plays along with the idea Obama has created over five million new jobs. OBAMA! Unfortunately, at the same time we have more potential unemployed workers than we did before the economy (not Obama) created those five million jobs.

We’re losing ground each month, even as it relates to new workers entering the potential worker pool. Never-mind all the folks already out of work. This is in addition to that.

I state this knowing you two already know this. Perhaps some other people will come along who don’t. And even if no one does, this needs to be repeated by everyone until the DNCp starts addressing it.

[PermaRag]

I’ll bet it just kills the puppetmaster-controlled Media to have to use the word “modest” when obviously “spectacular!!!” would be far more appropriate to their cheerleading and their goal of 4 more years for President Choomy.

[Mike Darancette]

Yes the unemployment rate grew modestly.