Chart of the Day: Net New Jobs in April

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The American economy added 165,000 new jobs last month, but about 90,000 of those jobs were needed just to keep up with population growth, so net job growth clocked in at 75,000. That’s OK, but not great. However, the BLS also revised its job growth estimates for the past two months fairly sharply upward. February’s figures are now positively giddy looking.

Overall, the headline unemployment number dropped to 7.5 percent. The number of long-term unemployed declined even more dramatically, and the labor force participation ratio was flat.

Basically, it was all fairly decent news, both in the top line numbers and in the details. If the fiscal cliff deal and the sequester have had a negative impact on the economy, it’s not really showing up in the job numbers yet. So far, 2013 is shaping up as a rerun of 2012, which means that although we still aren’t recovering at the rate we ought to be, at least we’re treading water fairly briskly.

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WE CAME UP SHORT.

We just wrapped up a shorter-than-normal, urgent-as-ever fundraising drive and we came up about $45,000 short of our $300,000 goal.

That means we're going to have upwards of $350,000, maybe more, to raise in online donations between now and June 30, when our fiscal year ends and we have to get to break-even. And even though there's zero cushion to miss the mark, we won't be all that in your face about our fundraising again until June.

So we urgently need this specific ask, what you're reading right now, to start bringing in more donations than it ever has. The reality, for these next few months and next few years, is that we have to start finding ways to grow our online supporter base in a big way—and we're optimistic we can keep making real headway by being real with you about this.

Because the bottom line: Corporations and powerful people with deep pockets will never sustain the type of journalism Mother Jones exists to do. The only investors who won’t let independent, investigative journalism down are the people who actually care about its future—you.

And we hope you might consider pitching in before moving on to whatever it is you're about to do next. We really need to see if we'll be able to raise more with this real estate on a daily basis than we have been, so we're hoping to see a promising start.

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