The nation’s unemployment rate bolted to 7.2 percent in December, the highest since early 1993, as nervous employers slashed 524,000 jobs.
The Labor Department’s report, released Friday, underscored the terrible toll the deepening recession is having on workers and companies, and highlights the hard task President-elect Barack Obama faces in resuscitating the flat-lined economy.
For all of 2008, the economy lost a net total of 2.6 million jobs. That was the most since 1945, when nearly 2.8 million jobs were lost. Although the number of jobs in the U.S. has more than tripled since then, losses of this magnitude are still being painfully felt.
With employers throttling back hiring, the nation’s jobless rate averaged 5.8 percent last year. That was up sharply from 4.6 percent in 2007 and was the highest since 2003.
Although economists were forecasting even more payroll reductions in December – around 550,000 – job losses in both October and November turned out to be deeper than previously estimated. Revised figures showed that the employers slashed 584,000 positions in November and another 423,000 in October.
The unemployment rate, meanwhile, rose from 6.8 percent in November, to 7.2 percent last month, the highest since January 1993. Economists were expecting the jobless rate to rise to 7 percent.
(Source: CBS2 HD)
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2 Responses
Just remember according to the news reports this morning all this layoff hysteria started 4 months ago when it began to look good for obama. Being that everyone who is normal is afraid of what he will do and his far left wing agenda, they started laying off people in order to save cash.
Actually the problem began about 15 months ago when the banks suddenly realized they goofed.
Obama seems, at least in economic matters, to be a very main stream Wall Street/Ivy League type (so diversity means Ivy Leagues of different colors – heaven forbid we should have a president who went to a small public school, which we haven’t had since Reagan). It should be noted that Obama’s return to Keynesian economics is supported by most of the establishment, with the dissent limited to a few socialists (why are we saving the corporations) and a few very old fashioned “main street” conservatives who are worried about the massive “printing” of money.
The economy is collapsing because Americans have been living beyond their means for years using borrowed money (credit cards, using homes as ATMs rather than as savings, corporation doing queer things with bonds, etc.).