RSS Feed
May 4th, 2012 
FAKE NEWS for the Zionist agenda 
Stan Honda / AFP – Getty Images
People seeking jobs wait in line to speak to over 60 employers at an employment fair May 3, 2012 in the Queens borough of New York.
The U.S. economy generated fewer jobs than expected in April, but the unemployment rate dipped slightly and data from prior months was revised upward, painting a murky picture of labor market conditions.
It was the second straight month that hiring slowed in the U.S. and it raises concerns, six months before Americans go to the polls to choose either President Barack Obama or his Republican challenger Mitt Romney as president, that the nation’s job-creating machine is sputtering.
The Labor Department said Friday that non-farm payrolls rose by 115,000 last month, much lower than the consensus estimate of about 165,000. The jobless rate slid a notch to 8.1 percent from 8.2 percent, as more people left the work force.
Still, the government revised upward its initial estimates for payroll growth in February and March by a combined 53,000. That left the six-month average of job growth at 197,000, nearly exactly where it would have been had April job growth come in as expected at 170,000.
“We’re still growing just gradually,” said Nigel Gault, an economist at IHS Global Insight in Lexington, Massachusetts.
“Hiring is coming back into line with what you would expect with sluggish growth.”
The report, which regularly sets the tone for financial markets around the world, could rattle nerves at the White House. Weak U.S. growth and high unemployment create a formidable headwind for Obama, who entered office during the darkest days of the 2007-09 recession.
Romney repeatedly has accused Obama of doing too little to foster job growth.
“Dear Mr. President, Welcome to Ohio. I have a simple question for you: Where are the jobs?” Romney wrote in an op-ed in the Cleveland Plain Dealer Friday.
The White House had a different take. “We see a picture of the economy healing,” said White House Council of Economic Advisers Chairman Alan Krueger in an interview on CNBC.
The unemployment rate, which soared to as high as 10 percent during Obama’s first year in the office, held near 9 percent for most of last year before falling sharply over the winter.
The unemployment rate drops to 8.1 percent and U.S. employers added 115,000 jobs for the month. A CNBC panel discusses the data.
Still, it remains about 2 percentage points higher than its average over the last 50 years, and the U.S. Federal Reserve thinks it probably will not post a full recovery for at least another several years.
Nevertheless, Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke said last month the central bank is providing enough support for the economy.
So far this year, the labor market has given mixed signals.
During the winter, fast growth in payrolls led many analysts to think the economy was turning a corner. Then jobs growth braked in March, fueling fears the recovery was losing momentum.
Most economists think mild weather muddied the waters, boosting hiring in the winter but making spring look weaker because companies had pulled hiring forward.
“It’s not that there’s something wrong with the economy. Employment just got ahead of itself,” said Robert Mellman, an economist at JPMorgan in New York.
The report showed the private sector accounted for all the job gains in April, adding 130,000 new positions. Manufacturing registering another strong month, adding 16,000.
Wall Street analysts see economic growth holding at a lackluster 2.2 percent annual rate in the second quarter, matching its pace in the first three months of the year.
The length of the average work week held steady at 34.5 hours in April.
Reuters contributed to this report.
Warren Buffett says the rate of economic improvement has been held back by home construction.
Posted in 
Tags: 
