US Unemployment Rate Drops Amid Struggling Economy
The U.S. unemployment rate dropped in the month of October, however the upturn in unemployment does not necessarily signal a significant rise in the economy before the holidays.
The data released by the U.S. Department of Labor showed that companies added 80,000 jobs in October and the unemployed rate dropped to nine percent. However, the data does not signal the best case scenario as it indicated that job growth was slower for the month of October than it was for the two previous months.
The fall in unemployment came at .1 percent from the month prior, and the number of jobs added was less than had been forecasted prior to the report.
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A large proportion of the jobs added to the economy were in the business services.
During the month of September the economy added 158,000 jobs, thus, although the unemployment rate for October declined, the amount of jobs available to unemployed Americans went down from the month prior, signaling a slow down in the overall economy.
Another signal of slow down in the U.S. economy came from the U.S. Federal Reserve this week.
The Federal Reserve initially projected that the unemployment rate would fall to 7.8 percent in the upcoming year. However, this week the Fed increased its expectation projecting that the unemployment rate would only go down to anywhere from 8.5 to 8.7 percent.
Meanwhile there is still a long way to go in terms of job creation in the U.S.
A still large segment of the population remains unemployed, 13.9 million people, while 42 percent of that number has been unemployed for the long term or as defined by unemployment that exceeds 27 weeks.
Secretary of Labor, Hilda L. Solis, said in a statement of the new numbers, “The policies this administration has pursued have added jobs back into the economy, but the pace of our recovery continues to be influenced by the failure of Congress to pass legislation to put Americans back to work.”
The high rate of unemployment has spurred off movements across the country with protesters fighting the lack of jobs and high rate of inequality in the United States.
