Economic Watch: Unemployment Lowest in a Decade, Factory Orders Move Higher
Unemployment in the U.S. has fallen again, hitting its lowest level in a decade but minus any contribution from trucking in April, according to a new report released Friday. Meanwhile, a separate report shows some improvements in the nation’s struggling manufacturing sector.
Employers added 211,000 non-farm jobs last month, better than expectations of 190,000 job additions and well above the downwardly revised 79,000 jobs added last month while the February jobs gain was increased to 232,000 from 219,000.
This pushed the nation’s unemployment rate down 0.1 of a percentage point to 4.4%, its lowest reading since May 2007.
Despite the overall performance, for-hire trucking employment was nearly unchanged, shedding just 100 jobs during April while the wider transportation and warehousing sector added 3,500 jobs. This was mainly due to increased manpower for support activities related to transportation as well as gains in the couriers and messengers as well as the warehousing and storage categories.
The report also showed average wages in April climbed 0.3% from the month before to $26.19 per hour while hourly pay increased 2.5% from the same time a year ago. But that was hardly better than the 12-month increase of 2.4% in the consumer price index, the nation’s widest measure of inflation.
The rise in April payroll employment provides some evidence that the weakness in March was an anomaly and that business confidence remains robust to take on more workers, according to Paul Ferley, assistant chief economist at RBC Economics Research.
“The wage increase did moderate slightly in April but is still indicative of real wage gains,” he said. “This continued support to household incomes should contribute to second quarter consumer spending growth, and overall second quarter gross domestic product growth, rebounding to an above-average rate after a disappointing first quarter increase.”
Also, the report is quite likely to push the Federal Reserve …Read the rest of this story
