National unemployment rate drops to 9.7 percent in January

Pamplin Media Group, Feb 5, 2010 (3 Reader comments)

The national unemployment rate fell to 9.7 percent in January from 10 percent in December, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported Friday.

The nation lost about 20,000 jobs last month, with employment falling in construction, transportation and warehousing. Temporary services and the retail trade added jobs in January, according to the bureau.

Oregon's unemployment rate in December was 11 percent. January numbers for the state will be released this month.

In January, the bureau reported that 14.8 million people were unemployed. Teenagers were the largest group of the unemployed, at 26.4 percent, followed by African-Americans (16.5 percent), Hispanics (12.6 percent) and adult men (10 percent).

The rate for unemployed women fell to 7.9 percent.

The number of long-term unemployed (those jobless for 27 weeks and over) continued to rise in January, reaching 6.3 million. Since the start of the recession in December 2007, the number of long-term unemployed has risen by 5 million.

The number of people working part-time, but who want to work full-time, fell from 9.2 million in December to 8.3 million in January.

The number of “discouraged workers” (those who have given up looking for a job) increased by 1.1 million in January, up from 734,000 a year earlier.

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Reader comments

Re: National unemployment rate drops to 9.7 percent in January

The nation lost 20,000 jobs, but the unemployment rate went down. Do you guys even proof read this stuff, or do you simply lack intellectual curiosity? The unemployment rate went down because of your last sentence, which should have been your headline and your story. 1.1 million discouraged workers either stopped filing or their benefits ended, hence fewer "unemployed". Gosh, if ten percent more would give up we would have a zero unemployment rate. That may be why the democrats are doing their level best to discourage everyone; window dressing.

"atlas barfed"

(email verified)

Sat, Feb 06, 2010 at 10:25 AM

Re: National unemployment rate drops to 9.7 percent in January

Even though unemployment went down in January, there's an interesting piece from Julian Alssid at the Workforce Strategy Center about how America’s workforce remains ill-prepared to compete with the world...

http://workforcedev.typepad.com/workforcedev/2010/02/unemployment-american-workforce.html

"Vanessa"

(email verified)

Tue, Feb 09, 2010 at 11:26 AM

Re: National unemployment rate drops to 9.7 percent in January, but as usual, there's MORE to the story

The overall unemployment rate dropped to 9.7% in January, but the job market shed 20,000 more jobs than it created.

For the second straight month, the number of jobs lost outnumbered the jobs created, while 7 to 8 million illegal aliens remain in the U.S. workforce.

The U-6 unemployment rate, which also includes individuals who have recently given up their job search and those that have settled for part-time work, dropped from 17.3% to 16.5%.

The total number of unemployed Americans is 14.8 Million.

While the overall unemployment number went down, the number of unemployed Americans in some of the vulnerable groups STILL increased. The unemployment rate among Black Americans increased from 16.2% to 16.5%. The rate for Black men over the age of 20 increased from 16.6% to 17.6%.

Congress has begun work on a new jobs bill, and eight Senate Republicans are urging Majority Leader Harry Reid to adopt an immigration-related amendment that would help unemployed Americans.

See their recommendations in the article 20,000 Jobs Lost In January at http://www.numbersusa.com/content/.

On their homepage you can also look at what was ACTUALLY HAPPENING on the border (with frightening video to help illustrate) at the SAME time Secretary of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano was telling Congress that the border has been "transformed" under her watch and is now secure enough to pass an amnesty.

The border is NOT secure and amnesty = the PERMANENT loss of over 8 MILLION non-agricultural jobs to illegal foreign workers at the expense of unemployed Americans.

Rule of law is NOT "racism" or LACK of "compassion".