Economist.com | America's labour market: ...On Friday December 5th, the Bureau of Labour Statistics announced that another 57,000 Americans were added to the (non-farm) payrolls in November.... [T]he labour market is still far from strong.... With output roaring away, analysts had expected hiring to move up a gear, adding 150,000 to 200,000 people to the payrolls. Instead, the labour market remains in neutral. There may be a few more jobs than a month ago, but there are also more people to find jobs for. About 140,000 people enter the labour force on average every month.... Output often recovers before employment, because firms hesitate to add to workforces they have just finished cutting. But in most recoveries, this hesitation lasts only about three months. This time round... it lasted a year and a half.... [P]ayroll employment is still 700,000 lower than it was when the recession ended in November 2001....
It may be little consolation to Mr Bush junior, but strong growth coupled with tepid hiring is doing marvellous things to the productivity numbers.... The problem with creative destruction is that the destruction seems to arrive long before the creation.
A puzzle for economists, jobless recoveries are also a conundrum for psephologists, who study presidential elections. We know it's the economy, stupid, but is it growth or jobs that have most bearing on the way people vote?.... Professor Michael Lewis-Beck of the University of Iowa and Charles Tien of Hunter College think unemployment is a more decisive factor. In every election since the second world war, falling unemployment in the spring of election year has foretold victory for the party in charge of the White House...
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