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U.S. Economy Added 162,000 Jobs
in March, Most in 3 Years</font size><font size="4"
Nationwide, the unemployment rate held steady at 9.7 percent</font size></center>
onstruction workers at work on a planned shopping center in Philadelphia this week. Most major
industry showed gains in employment last month.
By CATHERINE RAMPELL and JAVIER C. HERNANDEZ
Published: April 2, 2010
The clouds have parted.
After more than two years in which more than 8 million jobs were lost, the country’s nonfarm payrolls surged in March.
Employers added 162,000 jobs last month, and employment numbers in the previous two months were revised upward. Nationwide, the unemployment rate held steady at 9.7 percent.
To many ordinary, out-of-work Americans, the recovery may finally start to feel real.
“The key message from this report is that we’ve finally turned the corner,” said Nigel Gault, chief United States economist at IHS Global Insight. “Going forward, we should expect things to strengthen further over the rest of the year.”
Christina D. Romer, chairwoman of President Obama’s Council of Economic Advisers, said in a statement that the report showed “continued signs of gradual labor market healing.”
Ms. Romer added, however, that “there will likely be bumps in the road ahead.”
Nearly a third of the gains came from temporary hiring for the 2010 Census, which will continue over the next couple of months. The report was also complicated by a rebound from weather-related work stoppages in February.
But even setting aside these caveats, many Americans found work in March.
“Every major industry, except financial services and information, showed gains in employment,” John Ryding, chief economist at RDQ Economics, said. “From manufacturing, to construction, to retail, it really didn’t matter. They’re all hiring now.”
Private-sector job growth was biggest in health care and temporary help services. Since September 2009, temporary help services have added 313,000 jobs, including 40,000 last month. Health care, which grew steadily even during the depths of the recession, has added 588,000 jobs since the start of the downturn over two years ago, including 27,000 jobs in March.
Though they know their jobs are temporary, many of the 48,000 workers hired by the Census are counting their blessings. To these Americans, a job is a job, a closed hole in their résumés and maybe even a bridge to permanent employment elsewhere.
Gregory A. Butler, a 41-year-old union carpenter in West Harlem, had been unable to find work since November. Then last month, he got a call from the Census Bureau asking him to work as a supervisor. Unlike most of the department’s new hires, who are part-time, he expects to work 40-hour weeks for about two months, at $20 an hour.
“This is a very good transition opportunity for me, since I’m trying to start a new career as a freelance writer,” Mr. Butler said. “I don’t mind that it’s temporary. It’s important work, and it gets me off unemployment.”
The disconnect between the rise in payroll jobs and the flat unemployment rate partly reflects the fact that some discouraged workers are starting to trickle back into the labor force and search for jobs again.
Because so many of the jobs created were part-time jobs for people who really wanted full-time work, the broader measure of unemployment and underemployment ticked up, to 16.9 percent, from 16.8 percent the previous month. And the number of people out of work for at least 27 weeks increased by 414,000 last month, to 6.5 million.
“We have had this massive disaster, but we’re at a place now where things are stabilizing,” said Heidi Shierholz, an economist at the Economic Policy Institute in Washington. “But the report does not signal yet that the private sector is poised to create jobs at a healthy enough rate to start bringing unemployment down.”
The economy must create at least 100,000 jobs each month just to absorb new entrants into the labor force, let alone provide a livelihood for the nation’s 15 million people already looking for work.
That sustained level of growth may not come until later this year, economists said, making pervasive unemployment a virtual certainty for some time to come.
Indeed, the government predicts the jobless rate will average 9.8 percent next year and 8.4 percent in 2012 before falling to 5 percent in 2016. The rate was 4.7 percent in November 2007, the month before the recession began.
Friday’s report was largely in line with expectations, but economists noted it may be difficult to gauge the health of the labor market for the near future. The hiring of thousands of part-time census workers will continue through end of the summer, inflating the numbers.
The economy has shown signs of renewal in recent months with the help of significant government spending. Analysts generally believe the recovery will endure even in the absence of stimulus programs.
“Strength effectively feeds itself,” said James F. O’Sullivan, chief economist for MF Global. “What happens to the labor market is key to perceptions about the sustainability of the recovery.”
But substantial worries persist. Consumer spending remains tepid, though it has improved modestly in recent months. Real estate markets are still severely depressed, holding back hiring in critical industries like construction. And many state and local governments, facing ballooning deficits, are poised to make severe cutbacks.
Those uncertainties have left 15 million Americans out of work, many of them for more than six months.
In Roseville, Mich., a suburb of Detroit, Mark R. Hamlin, is nearing his fourth year without work. Mr. Hamlin, 49, was laid off from his position as a sales manager for a copper wire distributor just as the auto industry began to collapse. Though his wife has a job, the Hamlins struggle to keep up with a $900 monthly mortgage payment and $5,000 in credit card debt. To cut costs, they keep the heat at 55 degrees.
With his latest round of unemployment benefits expiring this week, Mr. Hamlin said he worries that he may not be able to give his 4-year-old daughter Kara a stable upbringing.
“I’m hoping, I’m praying, I have my fingers crossed,” Mr. Hamlin said. “I’ve got to find something this year. I’ve got to find something this year.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/03/business/economy/03jobs.html