So why call it growth?
Yesterday I linked to a really clumsy attempt to spin the latest unemployment numbers. Here's the real deal.
Job Growth Is Well Below Wall Street Forecasts
By EDMUND L. ANDREWSWASHINGTON, Dec. 3 - The economy added 112,000 payroll jobs in November, the Labor Department reported today, far fewer than the month before and not enough to keep up with growth in the adult population.
The gain was well below Wall Street forecasts for an increase of about 200,000 jobs, and employment in manufacturing remained stagnant for the third month in a row.
The overall unemployment rate remained unchanged at 5.4 percent and has essentially been flat ever since July, the Labor Department said.
Bond investors immediately reacted to the disappointing report by pushing up prices of Treasury securities, on the expectation that economic growth will be more moderate and that interest rates will be under less pressure to climb.
"The economy is adding jobs, but not at a feverish pace," said Richard Yamarone, chief economist at Argus Research, an economic research firm in New York. "Economic growth is not expanding at a pace that can engender stellar job growth, and I think you have to get used to these kinds of numbers."
