Economy Alarm: It’s Official: Final Jobs Report Confirms Obama’s Failed Economic Policies

Obama Promised ‘We are Headed in the Right Direction’ and Urged Americans to Stick With His Economic Policies

“President Obama cited some good parts of today’s unemployment report… ‘Make no mistake, we are headed in the right direction,’ Obama said… Obama said the economy is continuing to recover from a crippling recession and is also fighting ‘headwinds from volatile global markets.’… ‘We’re moving forward,’ Obama said. ‘And to every American who is looking for work, I promise you, we are going to keep on doing everything that we can, I will do everything in my power, to help our economy create jobs and opportunity for all people.’” (“Obama on jobs: ‘We are headed in the right direction,’ USA Today, 07/02/10)

“President Obama urged a crowd today to stick with his economic policies as the nation slowly recovers from an economic crisis more than a decade in the making.” (Obama: ‘A lot of people out there are still hurting’, USA Today, 09/20/10)

Credibility Crash: Less than Four Weeks Before Election Day, Final Unemployment Report a Referendum on Democrats’ Failed Economic Policies

The U.S. lost more jobs than forecast in September, reflecting a decline in government payrolls that shows the damage being done by rising fiscal deficits.
Employers cut staffing by 95,000 workers after a revised 57,000 decrease in August, Labor Department figures in Washington showed today. The median estimate of economists surveyed by Bloomberg News called for a 5,000 drop. The unemployment rate unexpectedly held at 9.6 percent.

Private payrolls that exclude government agencies climbed 64,000, less than forecast, underscoring the concern expressed by some Federal Reserve policy makers that the rebound from the worst recession since the 1930s has been too slow and may require easier monetary policy. Economists surveyed by Bloomberg project unemployment will average at least 9 percent through 2011, which may restrain consumer spending, the biggest part of the economy.

“The pace of this employment rebound has been quite sluggish,” Steven Wood, president of Insight Economics LLC in Danville, California, said before the report. “Employers are still very cautious about hiring.”

Projections of 83 economists for the unemployment rate ranged from 9.6 percent to 9.8 percent after the 9.6 percent rate reported in August. Estimates for private payrolls ranged from no change to an increase of 110,000.

The Labor Department today also published its preliminary estimate for the annual benchmark revisions to payrolls that will be issued in February. They showed the economy may have lost an additional 366,000 jobs in the 12 months ended March 2010. The data currently show a 1.7 million drop in employment during that time.

Longest Since 1948

The jobless rate has equaled or exceeded 9.5 percent for 14 consecutive months, surpassing the 13-month period from mid 1982 to mid 1983 as the longest span of elevated joblessness since monthly records began in 1948.

The decrease in overall payrolls reflected a 77,000 decline of temporary workers hired by the government to conduct the decennial population count and a 49,800 drop in teaching jobs at the local government level.

The unwinding of census employment has distorted the payroll figures for months as the government dismissed workers as the count winds down. For that reason, economists say private payrolls, which exclude government jobs, are a better gauge of the state of the labor market. Only about 6,000 census workers remain on the payrolls, indicating September may be the last month the jobs data will be distorted.

Manufacturing payrolls decreased by 6,000 after declining 28,000 a month earlier. Economists projected a 2,000 increase for September.
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Obama Policies

Voters are increasingly skeptical of the Obama administration’s economic policies heading into November elections that will determine which political party leads Congress. Obama’s job approval over a three-day period that ended Oct. 5 was 43 percent, compared with 53 percent at the same time last year, according to a poll from Princeton, New Jersey-based Gallup Inc. (Timothy R. Homan, “Employers in U.S. Cut More Jobs Than Forecast in September,” Bloomberg, 10/08/10)

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