In today's employment report, we were looking for October job losses in the 160,000 to 170,000 range. We got 190,000 losses, and an unemployment rate of 10.2%. This looks very disappointing on the surface. But the report also reveals that the Bureau of Labor Statistics made very positive adjustments to the August and September job-loss numbers. The losses in total nonfarm payroll employment for August was revised from 201,000 to 154,000; the change for September was revised from 263,000 losses to 219,000. These are big adjustments. That's about 100,000 more jobs than we that we had, and they're across many different sectors. If you net the past three months together, we're better off today than we thought we were yesterday. |