Say Anything Blog

By Noel Sheppard

Oops: Employment Numbers Better Than Expected, Unemployment Drops

Despite all the gloom and doom, the employment picture in April was much better than economists had expected, and, maybe more important, quite different than the Hooveresque, Depression Era picture media members have been painting for months.

Makes you wonder if in press rooms all around America, as well as in Democrat campaign headquarters across the fruited plain, there was a huge sigh of disappointment at 8:30 AM EDT when the Labor Department released the data.

Critical updates at end of post including FAR better-than-expected factory orders report!

As such, without further ado, here’s the news most people in the nation actually hoping for a good economy will be glad to hear:

Nonfarm payroll employment was little changed in April (-20,000), following job losses that totaled 240,000 in the first 3 months of the year, the Bureau of Labor Statistics of the U.S. Department of Labor reported today. The unemployment rate, at 5.0 percent, also was little changed in April.

To put this in some perspective, both numbers are far better than what analysts were predicting. As reported by Bloomberg moments before the data was released:

Payrolls shrank by 75,000 workers after decreasing by 80,000 in March, according to the median estimate of 82 economists surveyed by Bloomberg News before the Labor Department’s report. The jobless rate rose to a three-year high of 5.2 percent, the survey also showed.

Hmmm. So this was MUCH better than expected, for not only did the economy shed less jobs than predicted, but also the unemployment rate DROPPED to 5.0 percent instead of rising to 5.2.

It’s going to be delicious to watch how all the liberal media members trying to convey Depression-like conditions in the nation in order to get a Democrat in the White House are going to negatively spin this one.

Stay tuned.

*****Update. Since it seems a metaphysical certitude media will, once again, refuse to give any historical reference to the jobs losses we’ve been seeing so far this year, here are the payroll declines in the first four months of the previous four recessions:

* 1980: 1,159,000
* 1981-82: 914,000
* 1990-91: 484,000
* 2001: 578,000

This means the average four-month loss of jobs at the beginning of the previous four recessions was 783,000. By contrast, we’ve lost 260,000 non-farm workers since December, or exactly one-third the recent average.

I’m sure media will inform the citizens of this.

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*****Update III: Factory orders for March were just released, and the data is stunning—up 1.4 percent. Estimates were for a 0.2 percent rise. WOW!!!

I guess the economy didn’t get the Dem talking points.