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Francis Cianfrocca joins Ben Domenech for the Friday, August 7th edition of Coffee & Markets, a series of brief morning podcasts on politics and the marketplace.
Today’s podcast concerns the job statistics released this morning: what they mean for the economy, and what they mean politically.
TNLWASHINGTON — U.S. job losses tapered off last month while the unemployment rate surprisingly fell, providing further evidence that the U.S. recession is nearing an end.
Payroll cuts slowed in a variety of industries including manufacturing and many services while the automobile sector posted a rare increase, as anticipated seasonal layoffs failed to materialize last month.
Nonfarm payrolls declined 247,000 in July, the Labor Department said Friday, the smallest drop since last August and below the 275,000 decline economists in a Dow Jones Newswires survey had expected.
Though still a terrible loss by historical standards, the data suggest a turning point is at hand after job cuts earlier in the year that totaled as much as 700,000. The economy has lost 6.7 million jobs since the recession started in December 2007.