[Danzig]

from the new york times this morning:

July’s job growth was higher than economists had been expecting, but no one is yet popping champagne corks. The unemployment rate ticked up to 8.3 percent from 8.2 percent.

“It’s a lot better than we’d been seeing in the last few months, but it’s still short of the kind of job growth we were seeing at the beginning of this year,” said Paul Ashworth, chief United States economist at Capital Economics.

As for the pace of hiring through the rest of the year, he said, “I think this is about as good as it’s going to get.”

For context, the economy now produces as many goods and services — more, in fact — than it did before the downturn officially began in December 2007. But it does so with almost five million fewer jobs.

And the rate at which the economy has been adding jobs in the last few months is just barely fast enough to absorb the growth in the labor force.

“In the weakest recovery since the Great Depression, nearly the entire reduction in unemployment since October 2009 has been accomplished through a significant drop in the percentage of adults participating in the labor force — either working or looking for work,” said Peter Morici, a professor at the University of Maryland.



you know, obama said when he took office that the economy would be the number one priority. yeah, right. everyone in d.c. twiddling their thumbs, while nothing happens.