Looking Between The Sheets On Today's Job's Number

While most of the headlines will read that it is the first time in 3 years that jobs have been added to the economy and that the economy may have turned the corner, don't be two quick to fall into that trap.

First of all, of the 162,000 jobs that were created last month, 48,000 were temporary Census worker jobs and another 40,000 were temporary positions in the private sector. So, in reality, only 74,000 full time jobs were created in March. As a country, our population grows at a rate of 250,000 persons (net of births versus deaths) per month. So, in effect, the addition of 75,000 full time jobs in March fell well short of the rate of population growth. We really need to have job additions in excess of 250,000 jobs in order to truly tick away at the 8.5 million people who became unemployed during this recession.

Secondly, the number of people who have been out of work for more than 6 months rose, again, by another 441,000 job seekers. That says more about the job situation that the mere addition of 162,000 jobs. That number has to stop growing before anyone can really say that this economy has turned the corner on jobs.

Lastly, with the unemployment rate remaining static at 9.7%, the true unemployment rate, the one which includes discouraged workers, rose again from 16.8% to 16.9%. This is a disturbing number. Every month, the Bureau of Labor and Statistics just ignores these people in the discouraged worker category as if they are no longer part of the workforce. This, then, artificially makes the unemployment rate look better. So that you understand what a discouraged worker actually is, it is a person who, in the last four weeks or more, has given up looking for work because they have tried so long without any success. While some discouraged workers might be those who took early retirement and may never return to the workforce, there are still millions more who need to work but have an economic or social setting which allows them not to have to look for work in the short term. These could be college graduates who continue to live at home with there parents. It could be a spouse who needs to work but has decided to become a stay at home mom or dad until the job situation gets better. It could be a complete family who has been forced to move in with relatives in order to weather the recession. Lastly, it could be the homeless and jobless persons who have been forced to live in tent cities or on the streets. In any event, these people fully intend to work again but have statistically been shoved off the workforce map.

One last comment about the Census workers. In past Censuses, about 10 to 15% of the overall jobs were filled by this time. That means, that about 100,000 to 150,000 should have been hired in March. Yet, only 48,000 workers were added. Does this indicate a brewing problem in properly completing this decade's Census data?

For a complete summary of this month's jobs data please Click Here.

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