85,000 Jobs Lost in December, Unemployment Steady at 10%

[tritsofme]

However November has been revised upward, to 4,000 job gain, the first in 2 years.
THE EMPLOYMENT SITUATION -- DECEMBER 2009


Nonfarm payroll employment edged down (-85,000) in December, and the unem-
ployment rate was unchanged at 10.0 percent, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statis-
tics reported today. Employment fell in construction, manufacturing, and
wholesale trade, while temporary help services and health care added jobs.

Household Survey Data

In December, both the number of unemployed persons, at 15.3 million, and the
unemployment rate, at 10.0 percent, were unchanged. At the start of the re-
cession in December 2007, the number of unemployed persons was 7.7 million,
and the unemployment rate was 5.0 percent. (See table A-1.)


----------------------------------------------------------------------
| |
| Revision of Seasonally Adjusted Household Survey Data |
| |
|Seasonally adjusted household survey data have been revised using up- |
|dated seasonal adjustment factors, a procedure done at the end of each|
|calendar year. Seasonally adjusted estimates back to January 2005 were|
|subject to revision. The unemployment rates for January 2009 through |
|November 2009 (as originally published and as revised) appear in |
|table B, along with additional information about the revisions. |
| |
----------------------------------------------------------------------


Unemployment rates for the major worker groups--adult men (10.2 percent),
adult women (8.2 percent), teenagers (27.1 percent), whites (9.0 percent),
blacks (16.2 percent), and Hispanics (12.9 percent)--showed little change in
December. The unemployment rate for Asians was 8.4 percent, not seasonally
adjusted. (See tables A-1, A-2, and A-3.)

Among the unemployed, the number of long-term unemployed (those jobless for 27
weeks and over) continued to trend up, reaching 6.1 million. In December, 4 in
10 unemployed workers were jobless for 27 weeks or longer. (See table A-9.)

The civilian labor force participation rate fell to 64.6 percent in December.
The employment-population ratio declined to 58.2 percent. (See table A-1.)

The number of persons employed part time for economic reasons (sometimes re-
ferred to as involuntary part-time workers) was about unchanged at 9.2 million
in December and has been relatively flat since 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. (See table A-5.)

About 2.5 million persons were marginally attached to the labor force in
December, an increase of 578,000 from a year earlier. (The data are not sea-
sonally 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. (See table A-13.)

Among the marginally attached, there were 929,000 discouraged workers in
December, up from 642,000 a year earlier. (The data are not seasonally ad-
justed.) Discouraged workers are persons not currently looking for work be-
cause they believe no jobs are available for them. The remaining 1.6 million
persons marginally attached to the labor force had not searched for work in
the 4 weeks preceding the survey for reasons such as school attendance or
family responsibilities.

Establishment Survey Data

Total nonfarm payroll employment edged down in December (-85,000). Job losses
continued in construction, manufacturing, and wholesale trade, while temporary
help services and health care continued to add jobs. During 2009, monthly job
losses moderated substantially. Employment losses in the first quarter of 2009
averaged 691,000 per month, compared with an average loss of 69,000 per month
in the fourth quarter. (See table B-1.)

Construction employment declined by 53,000 in December, with job losses
throughout the industry. Employment in construction has fallen by 1.6 mil-
lion since the recession began.

In December, employment in manufacturing decreased by 27,000. The average
monthly decline for the last 6 months of 2009 (-41,000) was much lower than
the average monthly decline for the first half of the year (-171,000). Since
the recession began, manufacturing employment has fallen by 2.1 million; three-
fourths of this drop occurred in the durable goods component (-1.6 million).

Wholesale trade employment declined by 18,000 in December, with the majority of
the decline occurring among durable goods wholesalers. Employment in retail
trade was little changed over the month, although general merchandise stores
lost 15,000 jobs.

Temporary help services added 47,000 jobs in December. Since reaching a low
point in July, temporary help services employment has risen by 166,000.

Health care employment continued to increase in December (22,000), with notable
gains in offices of physicians (9,000) and home health care services (8,000).
The health care industry has added 631,000 jobs since the recession began.

In December, the average workweek for production and nonsupervisory workers on
private nonfarm payrolls was unchanged at 33.2 hours. The manufacturing work-
week, at 40.4 hours, and factory overtime, at 3.4 hours, were unchanged over
the month. Since May, the manufacturing workweek has increased by 1.0 hour.
(See table B-2.)

In December, average hourly earnings of production and nonsupervisory workers
on private nonfarm payrolls rose by 3 cents, or 0.2 percent, to $18.80. Over
the past 12 months, average hourly earnings have risen by 2.2 percent, while
average weekly earnings have risen by 1.9 percent. (See table B-3.)

The change in total nonfarm payroll employment for October was revised from
-111,000 to -127,000, and the change for November was revised from -11,000 to
+4,000.
_____________
The Employment Situation for January is scheduled to be released on Friday,
February 5, 2010, at 8:30 a.m. (EST).

http://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.nr0.htm

[CanonRay]

1. I thought we needed over 100K jobs a month

just so stay even. So how can unemployment be going down when we're still losing jobs? I call bullshit.

[TSstate]

2. Unemployment #

People leave the jobforce or stop looking for jobs and are dropped from the official unemployment number.

Edit: Also, if you're a laid off lawyer and get a job for 10 hours a week at home depot for $10/hour, you are no longer considered unemployed.

[tritsofme]

4. The unemployment rate and the payroll numbers come from different surveys.

The Current Population Survey, a scientific survey of 60,000 households each month calculates the unemployment rate. While the payroll numbers come from the
the Current Establishment Survey which gets it's data from employers.

Unemployment was steady this month despite continued payroll losses mostly due to the fact that the number of people losing jobs in the CPS was offset by the number who left the labor force, which essentially had a net effect of zero on the unemployment rate in December.

[DemocratSinceBirth]

5. They Need A New Measure

My buddy and I own a small publishing business. We publish a community newspaper and some other small publications. We forgot what a profit looks like but we are not counted among thr unemployed or underemployed.

I think this economy is in the ditch and will stay that way.

[ipaint]

3. Jobs Fall 85,000; Unemployment Rate 10 Percent

The economy lost more jobs than expected in December while the unemployment rate held steady at 10 percent, as a sluggish economic recovery has yet to revive hiring among the nation's employers.

The Labor Department said Friday that employers cut 85,000 jobs last month, worse than the 8,000 drop analysts expected. Employment fell in construction, manufacturing, and wholesale trade, while temporary help services and health care added jobs.

A sharp drop in the labor force, a sign more of the jobless are giving up on their search for work, kept the unemployment rate at the same rate as in November. Once people stop looking for jobs, they are no longer counted among the unemployed.

When discouraged workers and part-time workers who would prefer full-time jobs are included, the so-called "underemployment" rate in December rose to 17.3 percent, from 17.2 percent in October. That's just below a revised figure of 17.4 percent in October, the highest on records dating from 1994.

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=122355041