Today’s jobs report showed that 148,000 jobs were added in September, and the unemployment rate was little changed at 7.2 percent. The labor force participation rate and the employment-to-population ratio failed to increase. This report demonstrates once again that we are far from a full recovery. Also, it’s important to remember that the numbers released today are from September and in no way reflect the government shutdown in October, except for the fact that the release was delayed.
The September jobs growth of 148,000 was slower than the previous 12 month average of 185,000 per month, making barely a nick in our 8.2 million jobs gap.