What a nice surprise: 3 times bigger than Wall Street had expected and the biggest single month of job increase since April 2000.



March Job Growth Surprises with Strength
Friday April 2, 10:12 AM EST

By Tim Ahmann

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. employment rose last month at the fastest pace in nearly four years as hiring increased across a wide array of industries, the government said on Friday in a surprisingly strong report that stunned financial markets.

The report offers comfort to President Bush as the jobs market -- a hot political issue in the U.S. presidential campaign -- finally made a decisive break out of a long slump. Nevertheless, U.S. jobs lost since Bush took office still number a hefty 1.8 million.

Non-farm payrolls climbed 308,000 in March, helped a bit by the return of workers after a labor dispute at California grocery stores ended, the Labor Department said. This was the biggest gain since April 2000 and well above the 103,000 rise expected on Wall Street.

The big jump in March payrolls stood in sharp relief to the average gains of around 75,000 seen in the prior six months.

The unemployment rate, which is determined by a separate survey, ticked up to 5.7 percent from the two-year low of 5.6 percent seen in January and February.

The stock market opened strongly, the value of the dollar shot higher and U.S. bond prices plunged as investors were caught flat-footed by the labor market strength.

Economists said the report suggested the Federal Reserve could raise overnight interest rates from the current 1958 low of 1 percent sooner than had been expected.

"The Fed is still likely to wait and see if we see similar strong job growth in future months," said Gary Thayer, chief economist at A.G. Edwards & Sons in St. Louis. "But if we've turned the corner, the Fed may not wait much longer."

The department said the end to the California grocery store dispute, which had idled 72,000 workers, boosted March payrolls by 10,000 to 20,000. The impact was muted because many of the returning employees displaced temporary hires.

January and February payrolls were revised upward a combined 87,000, contributing to the report's positive tone.

"All in all, this is a very strong report," said Kurt Karl, head of research at Swiss Re in New York. "This is a number that everyone has been waiting for."

"It bodes well for the economy going forward," he said.

Job gains were widespread across industries.

Construction payrolls shot up by 71,000, a bounce-back from a 21,000 decline in February many economists had pinned on bad weather.

Retailers added 47,000 workers, in part a reflection of the return of the idled grocery store employees.

While a long-hoped for rise in manufacturing employment did not materialize, the department said factory payrolls were unchanged last month, finally breaking a string of 43 consecutive monthly declines.

The big payrolls jump offered hope the U.S. economy was finally moving out of an unusually long spell in which employment was either falling, or rising too slowly to keep up with the usual growth in the labor force.

While the economy climbed out of recession in November 2001, employment has yet to regain its pre-recession peak.

In the only other jobless recovery since World War II, which was the crawl back from the 1990-91 recession, it took 14 months for the number of employed to get back to where it stood when the recession ended.

This time it is 28 months, and counting. "

Companies are hiring now to boost Bush's approval rating, then if he's elected these new hires will all be laid off. My conspircy theory.

..but please bear in mind that 300,000+ filed new unemployment claims last month, so the NET gain is Z-E-R-O.....

Like I said, glad for the folks that found work, only 2.7 million more and bush will be back to even......

__________________
The last time this country mixed politics with religion, people got burned at the stake.

Job growth of 308,000, less the new unemployment claims uptick to 5.7% equals a zero net gain.

Also not mentioned are the inevitable effects that sky high energy and commodity prices that are rippling through the economy, as well as the spike in the 10yr bond rate which controls mortgage rates. The Japanese treasury stopped buying dollars (in the form of T-bonds), so the rate trend and dollar direction are likely to continue.

If you are going to trumpet economic news, you might consider painting the whole picture. Mixed is about the most optimistic thing I could say about this week.

oc

But if Joe Q. Voter sees such a number, methinks it helps Bush. If people think jobs are coming back, that should help the incumbent.

I love how the Bush economy realigns certain elite segments of our population. Chemists, computer programmers, engineers, tech writers, designers, architects, administrators and others of similar educational standing now have opportunities to have careers in humbling, more spiritual and less materialistic positions at Wall-Mart, McDonalds and Burger King.

And this will give a tremendous boost to our economy and drive down unemployment.

Hey? Is this the right place for this post? Or does it go under Mary’s I Love Bush Because…

__________________
"What does a former president's son know about the Iraq war anyway?"
-- GW Bush when asked about Ron Reagan's negative comments, 6/25/2004.
www.BushZombie.com

Ok 300,000 more jobs created as of March....

http://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.nr0.htm

Nonfarm payroll employment increased by 308,000 in March, and the
unemployment rate was about unchanged at 5.7 percent those are the jobs your talking about....Ok here is a funny thing in the same report.

The number of persons who were marginally attached to the labor force
totaled 1.6 million in March, about the same as a year earlier. (Data are not
seasonally adjusted.) These individuals wanted and were available to work and
had looked for a job sometime in the prior 12 months. They were not counted
as unemployed, however, because they did not actively search for work in the
4 weeks preceding the survey. There were 514,000 discouraged workers in March,
also about the same as a year earlier. Discouraged workers, a subset of the
marginally attached, were not currently looking for work specifically because
they believed no jobs were available for them. The other 1.1 million margin-
ally attached had not searched for work for reasons such as school or family
responsibilities. (See table A-13.)

So if you count the 514,000 that they decided to not count though are unemployed that means 206,000 jobs lost.

Real number of jobs created in march Friday's report that the economy created a mere 21,000 jobs last month was bad news for the president.


http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2004/...in604258.shtml

here is some jobs lost in march as well through government slashing they total. Workers and their families continue to struggle in the face of increased job loss, with U.S. companies and governments slashing 108,000 jobs last month. These number not added until May's report.

http://www.aflcio.org/yourjobeconomy/ns04042003.cfm

A sad but true article here as well.

http://www.progressive.org/march04/ivin0304.html

One of the saddest/funniest parts I found in it.

At the December rate of 1,000 new jobs a month, it would take 166 years just to replace the two million jobs lost since Bush became President, and that, of course, would be 166 years of not creating enough jobs for new workers. Or as John Kerry puts it, that leaves us only 249,000 jobs a month short of where we need to be and where, incidentally, the President promised we would be by now.

Oh well I think that if you want to look at statistical data...look at all of it. I'm not arguing that 300,000 less people are unemployment. Since The total number of people officially counted as unemployed in the Bay Area is 182,300, according to the most recent data. In California, according to the report, 1,072,000 people are unemployed. An estimated 314,344 Californians will have exhausted their benefits by June of this year. So thats just one states information I'd do the rest for yah...but I'm lazy.

that was taken from

http://edworkforce.house.gov/democra.../rel31604.html

Have at it...tell me all about how it's more jobs and ignore all the facts. I'd like to see where you are getting this info from. And if it's the official report LOL thats only the number of people on unemployment that they count. The sad fact as well if that. These are people that aren't counted in the number as well since their unemployment ran out in January, doesn't mean they found work...just lost unemployment. From late December, when the federal program designed to help the long-term unemployed began phasing out, through the end of February, an estimated 760,000 jobless workers will have exhausted their regular unemployment benefits without receiving additional aid, according to new projections by the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities.

http://www.cbpp.org/2-25-04ui-pr.htm

Ok your turn.

Why am I not surprised that each and every Bush hater on this board is unhappy about this news....or pooh-poohing in some way?

Wow. I'm glad I'm not a Democrat/liberal: wishing and hoping for bad things to happen to our country.

JP, I'm delighted you found a new job, I expect everyone who finds a new job to send a personal card of thanks to El pres .

I'm a job lover not a Bush hater, I'm a liberty lover not a Bush hater.I don't hate my country. I know it must be tough for someone that still takes off their shoes to count to eleven to fathom that but I look at the actual problem and want an actual solution not some completely nonsensical and uninformative ditto head response. Did you even follow the link and review the information or are you just some maniac that replies. "You are unpatriotic because you look at facts" and I can't understand why you aren't as blind as me? OK JP5 real nice point you made there...keep that train of information coming. I hope you don't consider yourself a Conservative.