U.S. Labor Market Remains Strong

The Labor Department announced nonfarm payrolls increased by 94,000 last month, beating economists' expectations. Forecasters were anticipating an increase of 85,000. September and October payroll figures were revised down a total of 48,000. The unemployment rate was a less than expected 4.7%, the third month in a row it gave that reading. "Once again, as markets were anticipating the economy falling off a cliff -- it isn't," said Mickey Levy, chief economist at Bank of America. "I'm sure when the number printed, the Fed had a sigh of relief that it wasn't a disastrous number." The Fed is set to meet next week and most are expecting some type of cut. After the report was released, futures prices indicated a 26% probability the Fed will make a 50 basis point cut, down from 36% yesterday, and a 74% chance the Fed will cut only 25 basis points.

Sources: MarketWatch, Bloomberg
Additional Reading: Fed Can't Engineer Business Cycles Away

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Comments

[Chuck]

And next month it will be revised downward, after everyone has forgotten about it.
Make it look good now, we'll revise it later.

[scott keeler]

Roy, Look beyond the headlines. Week 2 in Nov. unemployment was 112,000 jobs-- ad that to the revision from Oct., Sept. <45,000>--
and PRESTO he paltry 94,000 turns into 63,000 jobs LOST!!!
Then the quality of lost jobs (25,000 const., 20,000 fin., 11,000 manu.)
All to be replaces with temp. Wallmart greeters, gift wrappers and the like. 4.7% rate is due to the BLS handy birth death ratio. Like 2% CPI

[Will Rahal]

I think that Employment remains weak.
Both surveys show a deteriorating trend.

The yr/yr % change of the two major sectors of Employment, Services(84%) and Goods-Producing(16%) are at, or below the levels of the start of the 2001 recession.

[Cody]

Too bad the economy needs to creat 150000 jobs to break even... so it's really terrible news!

[lefty]

94000 what kind of jobs? Wal mart, target, mcdonalds, or jobs that pay a living wage. 4.7% unemployment? Where are those who's unemployment ran out? They are removed from the unemployed list.
But, they still exist in very large numbers. Statistics! Pleae include them ALL.