Everyone is celebrating because more than 242,000 jobs were added in the month of January as the unemployment rate held steady at 4.9 percent, according to data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS).
Should there be cause for celebration? You decide.
Most of the jobs that were created were minimum wage earners. In fact, 78 percent of the jobs created were retail trade, teachers, bartenders and waiters that paid the minimum wage. So, of the 242,000 jobs created, 189,000 of them were in the minimum wage ballpark.
Here is what the BLS states:
“Job growth occurred in health care and social assistance, retail trade, food services and drinking places, and private educational services.” Indeed, these are mostly low paying employment opportunities.
In other words, they were low paying and low quality, and this has been much of the case for the last seven years. The BLS has been doing this since the economic collapse to suggest a recovery is unfolding before our eyes. Tell that to those who have to work part-time jobs or be in precarious employment.
Meanwhile, the long-term unemployed (those out of work for 27 weeks or more) stayed roughly the same at two million, which accounted for nearly one-quarter of the unemployment rate.
Also, the average work week for employees in the private sector decreased by 0.2 hour to 34.4 hours. The average hourly earnings for all employees in the private sector fell by three cents to $25.35.
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