Friday, May 2, 2014

April's Good News

After the disappointing GDP number earlier in the week, we've got a stunner on the other side of the ledger this morning with the release of April's unemployment report. According to the Labor Department, the economy added 288,000 new jobs in April, which is the most in any single month since January 2012.

The headline unemployment rate took a huge dive, from 6.7 percent down to 6.3 percent. That puts unemployment at its lowest point since September 2008 - the month that the financial crisis reached a flashpoint, with the Lehman Brothers bankruptcy.

The industry report was very broad-based, with big gains in professional and business services (75,000 new jobs) and retail (35,000 new jobs). No segments reported significant losses. And February and March's job numbers were both revised upward as well. All in all, it's the most positive jobs report we've seen in a while.


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