Chart of the Day: Net New Jobs in September

Get your news from a source that’s not owned and controlled by oligarchs. Sign up for the free Mother Jones Daily.

The American economy added 114,000 new jobs last month. However, about 90,000 of those jobs were needed just to keep up with population growth, so net job growth is closer to 24,000 jobs. The chart below, which I update monthly, shows net job creation since the beginning of 2008. Those of you with sharp memories will note that the past three months look bluer than they used to. This is because the BLS revised its July and August estimates upward. It’s still nothing to write home about, but job creation over the past few months has been a bit healthier than it initially looked.

Politically, this jobs report has something for everyone. The Romney will camp will correctly point out that the recovery remains pretty sluggish. The Obama camp will correctly note that the unemployment rate has now fallen from 9.0% to 7.8% over the past year. The Romney camp will correctly point out that the payroll survey (see chart below) doesn’t suggest job creation is really all that robust right now. The Obama camp will simply be happy that the headline unemployment number went down a bunch and the Romney team can no longer chirrup endlessly about “xx straight months of unemployment above 8%.” You should feel free to adopt your own talking points accordingly.

UPDATE: I originally said that the unemployment rate had gone down partly because people were dropping out of the labor force and therefore no longer being counted as unemployed. That was true last month, but not this month. Sorry about that. I’ve corrected the post.

 

BEFORE YOU CLICK AWAY!

“Lying.” “Disgusting.” “Scum.” “Slime.” “Corrupt.” “Enemy of the people.” Donald Trump has always made clear what he thinks of journalists. And it’s plain now that his administration intends to do everything it can to stop journalists from reporting things they don’t like—which is most things that are true.

No one gets to tell Mother Jones what to publish or not publish, because no one owns our fiercely independent newsroom. But that also means we need to directly raise the resources it takes to keep our journalism alive. There’s only one way for that to happen, and it’s readers like you stepping up. Please help with a donation today if you can—even a few bucks will make a real difference. A monthly gift would be incredible.

payment methods

BEFORE YOU CLICK AWAY!

“Lying.” “Disgusting.” “Scum.” “Slime.” “Corrupt.” “Enemy of the people.” Donald Trump has always made clear what he thinks of journalists. And it’s plain now that his administration intends to do everything it can to stop journalists from reporting things they don’t like—which is most things that are true.

No one gets to tell Mother Jones what to publish or not publish, because no one owns our fiercely independent newsroom. But that also means we need to directly raise the resources it takes to keep our journalism alive. There’s only one way for that to happen, and it’s readers like you stepping up. Please help with a donation today if you can—even a few bucks will make a real difference. A monthly gift would be incredible.

payment methods

We Recommend

Latest

Sign up for our free newsletter

Subscribe to the Mother Jones Daily to have our top stories delivered directly to your inbox.

Get our award-winning magazine

Save big on a full year of investigations, ideas, and insights.

Subscribe

Support our journalism

Help Mother Jones' reporters dig deep with a tax-deductible donation.

Donate