The White House and Wall Street are celebrating as the official unemployment rate fell to 5.6 percent as non-farm payrolls rose 252,000 last month. The jobless rate now stands at a 6-1/2 year low, but a lot of people are finally acknowledging that much of the decline can be attributed to the fact that many Americans are exiting the labor force.
Wages continue to detract from the employment gains. Last month, average hourly earnings dropped five cents, after rising six cents in the previous month of November, according to the Department of Labor’s latest report.
Although the job creation was found in all sectors, the third-highest was situated in the service sector with 44,000.
The statistic for Americans that want to work but have given up searching for employment and those who are working part-time but want to work full-time is at 11.2 percent. Also, the labor force participation rate fell to a 37-year low from 62.9 percent to 62.7 percent. This figure has been about the same throughout all of 2014.
Nevertheless, these somewhat positive jobs numbers may further prompt the Federal Reserve to raise interest rates in the middle of the year. How much the Fed will raise it by remains unknown. Despite the falling jobless rate, there are still detractors that feel the United States central bank won’t risk hurting the economy or the improving labor market with a rate hike.
I see the government playing the same games they have been playing for more than 30 years. I sent an email to the White House (President Obama) and received an email back, stating the potential federal agencies and web sites mwhere a person who might find jobs a or other financial assistance through the government.
I have been unemployed for more than 2 1/2 years, I am over 50 years old and this makes the possibilities more difficult. As of this time I am not even counted in the unemployed as are some 5,000,000 – 6,000,000 other Americans. The figures that came out in December are literally useless, because many of those jobs, even though they may have been “full time” were not permanent. The US government has been doing this same crap employment statistic for many years to make themselves look good. The US government is among the most useless group of individuals that have evr existed. .