A bad jobs report for November; unemployment rate is 9.8%

On Friday, December 3rd, 2010, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported that the rate of unemployment was 9.8% of the total labor pool. There were bad unemployment signs across the board.

Non-farm payrolls were almost unchanged adding only 39,000. Unemployment rates for many major population groups increased for adult men, adult women, whites and Hispanics. The Black unemployment rate was 16.0%.

The number of long-term unemployed (6 months or longer) was 6.3 million. The number of marginally attached workers (people who looked for a job in the last 12 months but are not currently working) was reported at 2.5 million up from 2.3 million a year ago.

U-3 Unemployment Rate




U-6 People who want full-time work plus people working part time who want full-time.




In the establishment data categories, non farm payrolls increased by 39,000. Private firms added 50,000 jobs while government cut 11,000. Temporary help and healthcare added jobs while retail shed 28,000 positions. Manufacturing dropped 13,000 jobs. The average work week remained unchanged. Average earning increased by 1 cent.

The only positive item was the upward revision of the September and October Non-farm payroll numbers.

The misery rate, or the percent of the labor force who want work and cannot find it, grew to 17.0 . This is about 1/6 of the people in the labor force.


The jobs "deficit" is an incredible 8 million jobs lost since the start of the recession. Worse, job growth is flat for the past 5 months, with the growth rebound stopping in May.



Job growth has been flat on average since May 2010.



The Black unemployment rate was 16.0%.

This chart is always incredibly sad. This chart is the "real" black underemployment reate. If you take the trend for people who want work and cannot get it plus the black unemployment rate you get "real" underemployment rate: about 25%.



Another view of same data.




In related (unrelated ?) news, based on the unemployment report, the Dow-Jones index moved up 20 points, the NASDAQ closed higher by 12 points, and the S&P moved 3 points higher. The rise of the indexes shows the increasing separation of the jobs and unemployment issue from world of investments and corporations.

Finally, the consensus forecast from economists predicted a rise of 130,000 jobs for the month. Not even close to the actual rate of 39,000.