The Patriot Post® · Economists Expected a Scare but Oct. Jobs Report Not Bad

The U.S. economy added 271,000 jobs in October and the unemployment rate fell a tenth of a point to 5%. After the discouraging jobs reports for August and September, economists feared the worst for the Bureau of Labor Statistics’ October jobs report. For months, the economy has struggled to add enough jobs to keep pace with population growth, and economists thought the October report would say America gained only 185,000 jobs. Yet by some indicators in the report, the economy seems to be slowly turning around. Even the alternative measure of unemployment, the U-6 rate, dropped from September’s 10% to 9.8% for October. The BLS revised up its employment numbers for the late summer, reporting the economy added an additional 12,000 jobs. And while many of October’s hires were possibly in preparation for the holidays (44,000 jobs were added in the retail trade sector), the most notable areas of growth were in health care and professional and business services.

This encouraging report may precipitate Federal Reserve action on interest rates in December. The Washington Post reported ahead of BLS’s release that investors saw a 50% chance the Fed would raise interest rates next month. The report also means the economy could yet break free of Barack Obama’s economic quagmire. That’s good news, but it could prove politically challenging. As the American Enterprise Institute’s James Pethokoukis tweeted, “GOP couldn’t beat Obama with 8% unemployment. Can they beat Hillary when it’s 4% next November?”