WASHINGTON, D.C. — The U.S. unemployment rate dropped to a near four-year low of 7.8 percent in September, a potential boost to President Barack Obama’s re-election bid.
The Labor Department said on Friday the unemployment rate, a key focus in the race for the White House, dropped by 0.3 percentage point to its lowest point since January 2009 as
employers added 114,000 workers to their payrolls.
The drop in the unemployment rate reflected an even bigger surge in new jobs captured by a survey of households and came even as Americans returned to the labor force to resume the hunt for work. The workforce had shrank in the prior two months.
Payrolls for July and August were revised to show 86,000 more jobs created than previous reported, mostly to reflect increases in government employment.
The jobless rate is now where it was when Obama took office in January 2009. Household employment increased 873,000, the most since June 1983, according to the household survey. The bulk of the gains were part-time jobs.
“There is something in these numbers for everyone. The rise in the participation rate shows somewhat of a real improvement in the labor market,” said Omer Esiner, chief market analyst at Commonwealth Foreign Exchange in Washington.
U.S. stock index futures rose on the report, while prices for Treasury debt tumbled. The dollar rose versus the yen and the euro.
It was the second last report before the Nov. 6 election that pits Obama against Republican Mitt Romney.
A Reuters/Ipsos poll released on Thursday after Wednesday’s first presidential debate showed Romney gained ground and is now viewed positively by 51 percent of voters. Obama’s favorability rating remained unchanged at 56 percent.
Persistently poor labor market conditions led the Federal Reserve in September to announce a plan to buy $40 billion worth of mortgage-backed securities each month until it sees a sustained turnaround in employment.
The central bank, which also pledged to keep overnight lending rates near zero until at least mid-2015, hopes the purchases drive down long-term borrowing costs and spur the recovery.
The Fed’s ultra-easy stance has started to free up credit, giving a lift to consumers, economists said. That, in turn, helped lift retail hiring in September.
Temporary help jobs, which are often seen as a harbinger for permanent hiring, fell 2,000 after being almost flat in August.
Manufacturing payrolls fell for a second straight month.
Construction employment rose 5,000, benefiting from the rise in home construction, as demand for housing rises against the backdrop of record low mortgage rates
Government payrolls rose 10,000 after increasing 45,000 in August. Average hourly earnings rose 7 cents last month, which could support spending.
Hooray for Seasonal Jobs…..those are the jobs you find this time of year…..here’s hoping when the Holidays are over we dont find ourselevs in the employment hole again…
The Unemployment rate does not include seasonal employment. That is why it is always reported as seasonally adjusted. The more you know.
So you are saying that you trust the corperations when they say these jobs a permanient? How very hearts and flowers 8)
No, I am saying we should ignore all economic indicators because they make Obama look good. Let’s focus on getting Mitt elected even if the facts don’t line up with our narrative.
What the numbers do not reflect is the number of underemployed, or employees who have had their employment hours slashed, nor do they reflect the number of unemployed who have just simply stopped looking for employment and taken themselves out of the overall numbers…if these citizens were included in the total the unemployment numbers would be above 11% to 12% conservatively with some numbers showing the unemployed at 16%…..not quite as successful as thought….
Great, what were the numbers for that under Bush. Why do we all of a sudden start using a different metric when it comes to the Democrats being in charge?
Anyone can spin numbers and I have no idea who determines or changes the metrics used for arriving at end numbers such as unemployment…..what I have looked at today is the reaction of the business community and the numbers reported today are not stated to be “felt” or “seen” by business….and there were projections made by 25 top economic professionals as to the current unemployment numbers based on certain business and economic criteria and none of them “predicted” the low numbers given by the Bureau of a Labor Statistics today and could not get the number below 8%……it was stated that the BLS used telephone calls to collect some numbers and the current number is based on “assumption”…..the bottom line for me is that the business community is claiming that the current unemployment numbers are not reflected in the current economic activity….
Great, so you FEEL that it isn’t accurate. It is YOUR OPINION that these numbers do not reflect reality. However, forgive me if I don’t share your feelings and your opinion. I try to rely on facts and figures, and less on personal preference.
Thanks for endorsing my “feelings” but my opinions are based on facts being reported by business and economic professionals who are sharing their facts related to the job market and an overview of the number of actual jobs which were added last month (which are far less than what is needed just to meet baseline), the actual economic activity in their respective business interests, the fact that part-time jobs increased while full-time employment decreased, the fact that there is a different share of workers in the work-force than there was 4 years ago, the fact that as of this month manufacturing has lost over 600,000 jobs in the last 4 years and the simple truth (fact) that business is saying that the current economic activity in businesses across the board do not reflect the supposed “improvement” in the BLS report on unemployment….facts and certain figures just may not support each other…..
Those aren’t facts. They are anecdotal evidence. I know business people as well. The ones I know are doing very well and have been seeing a steady uptick in business. If you look at Wall Street we have had year after year of record profits. Business and business professionals are doing fine as a whole. In terms of manufacturing, maybe you should look at the trajectory for the past three years. I realize lots of people like to hang the job losses in the first 6 months of Obama’s term on him, believing that Presidents have an ability to right the ship on the VERY first day of office, however if you acknowledge that we were still suffering the effects of the previous administrations ineptness at that time, manufacturing has added jobs under Obama.
A drop of .3 percentage points doesn’t sound like a “tumble” to me. Bias in the headline.
And various wingnuts are saying that the Labor Department statisticians fudged the figures. There ain’t enough tinfoil in the world to make hats for all the conspiracy theorists . . .
Still waiting for the first politician, on either side of the aisle, to start talking about the real problem, under employment. The explosion of “public assistance” wage jobs in the last 20 years is killing our economy and decimating our middle class. While the working class of America have been watching their standard of living head for the toilet, the top 1% have skyrocketed upwards. They just reported another 13% gain in their wealth again this year. Did your savings or paycheck go up 13%? Did it go up at all? If you are like most Americans, it probably went down, again. So let’s all herd down to the pols like good sheep and vote Republican or Democrat again. I guess we like the abuse.