Friday, March 6, 2015

February's Jobs Report

We've had a strong of very strong months in the labor market, but somehow the news just keeps getting better. February's employment figures, released by the Bureau of Labor Statistics this morning, show that the economy added 295,000 jobs on the month. The headline unemployment rate dropped to 5.5 percent - the lowest it's been since May 2008. That's despite the fact that our terrible weather in February was expected by many to put the brakes on the hiring process.

We've had a a full year now with increases of at least 200,000 jobs per month. That hadn't happened since the go-go Nineties boom, in 1994-95. Over the past 12 months, we've seen an average monthly gain of 266,000 jobs. 

The stats on the quality of employment in February were mixed. The biggest single category adding jobs in February was food services and drinking places, with 59,000, and those are generally low-wage jobs. But the next-most was professional and business services at 51,000, and those are usually higher-paying, higher-prestige positions.


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