MORE FROM HUFFPOST
MORE FROM HUFFPOST
september jobs report
The September jobs report is spooking even the optimists.
The nation's payrolls rose by only 142,000 last month, and job gains for July and August were revised down by 59,000, suggesting the pace of job growth has slowed in recent months. Analysts were expecting job growth of around 200,000, and the question is how much should it change our views about underlying labor market conditions?
Last week, President Obama asked the American people to keep his liberal economic policies at the front of their minds this election season. Or as he put it: "These policies are on the ballot -- every single one of them."
WHAT'S HAPPENING
WHAT'S HAPPENING
The last time the unemployment rate was below 6 percent was in July 2008. Moreover, while the labor force fell slightly (though statistically insignificantly) last month, the decline in the jobless rate over the past year has come for the "right" reason: more people finding work, not leaving the job market.
So, that happened: Former Virginia Gov. Bob McDonnell's (R) career as a professional defendant has finished its first big story arc, with he and wife Maureen being convicted of 20 counts of corruption between them.
We're four years into a recovery that began in the second half of 2009, yet unemployment is still highly elevated, and job growth is once again decelerating. There should be no question that fiscal drag and general political dysfunction continues to hurt working families.
