Bad News, 7.2 Percent Unemployment Rate; Good News, Someone’s Still Hiring

Posted on | January 9, 2009 | No Comments

The Department of Labor (DOL) released its December Job Report today.  The report revealed unemployment has surpassed analysts’ forecasts landing at a gut-churning 7.2 percent (11.9 percent for Blacks and 9.2 percent for Hispanics).

Needless to say, the record-high unemployment rate (highest in 16 years) kicked off a wave of doomsday predictions from analysts and economists.  Many predict the unemployment rate will reach 9 percent.

There are now 11.1 million unemployed people, not counting the 8 million people hanging on by a thread in part-time jobs.  Those are astounding numbers.  Equally astounding is the fact that the average unemployed worker is now unemployed for nearly 20 weeks (23% are unemployed for 27 weeks or more).

The bad news keeps coming for workers in beleaguered industries such as manufacturing and construction.  In December, these industries lost 149,000 and 101,000 jobs, respectively.  Joining these industries in the loss column were Trade, Transportation & Utilities (121,000 jobs lost), Professional & Business Services (113,000 job lost), Retail (67,000 jobs lost) and Leisure & Hospitality (22,000 jobs lost).

Bright Spot(s)

The report did, however, manage a bit of good news.  Government, Education and Health Services added 7,000, 7,000 and 32,000 jobs, respectively.

In December, average hourly earnings of production and nonsupervisory workers on
private nonfarm payrolls rose by 5 cents, or 0.3 percent, seasonally adjusted.

And, just because jobs are being cut in your industry doesn’t mean they are all gone.  So, keep hunting (start with the job links above).

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