Monday, March 7, 2011

A Breath of Fresh Air

For quite some time, we have been waiting for the weekly new unemployment filings to go below 400,000. Even more important is to see the four-week average go below 400,000. For the week ending February 26th, the Labor Department reported the weekly new filings were 368,000 and the four-week average is 388,000. In addition, continuing jobless claims--people who have received benefits for more than a week--fell by 59,000 to 3.77 million. These are all positives on the job front. What we really want to see, however, is new job creation! Well, this too has been a positive. To absorb new workers entering the workforce, the economy needs to create about 100,000 jobs, on average, every month. Since November of 2010, the average is 120,000! The momentum is picking up, with 192,000 jobs added in February. The doom and gloom folks will point out that the number of people employed is still 7.5 million below the end of 2007, but I believe the trend is your friend and in this case the trend is going in the right direction. Hooray! Ed Mallon