Karl Rove

Job Growth Numbers for December 2010

Democrats promised in their January 2009 ?Romer-Bernstein Report? that the unemployment rate would be 7 percent at the end of 2010 if their stimulus passed. However, the unemployment rate was 9.4 percent in December, and the number of people unemployed for 27 weeks or more (as a percentage of all jobless) grew to 44.3 percent. There are 2.3 million fewer Americans employed now than when President Obama took office, and 5.9 fewer people working than the Obama Administration forecast would be employed.

Job Growth Numbers for November 2010

The U.S. economy saw weaker job growth than expected in November and the unemployment rate rose to 9.8% - its highest level since April. The unemployment rate has now been above 9% for 19 months, matching the recession of the early 1980's as longest stretch since World War II with unemployment at such a level. This jobs report comes a day after House Democrats passed a meaningless vote to extend only some of the Bush tax cuts, delaying efforts to stop the job-killing tax hikes that will occur when the Bush tax cuts expire on December 31.

Job Growth Numbers for October 2010

The October unemployment rate was unchanged at 9.6%, and 14.8 million Americans said they were still unemployed - a number that hasn't improved much since the beginning of the year. After the October numbers were released, President Obama said that they were "not good enough." The results of Tuesday's elections show American voters agree. President Obama and Democrats in Congress will have to work with the new Republican majority on issues like ObamaCare and Bush tax cuts if they are to succeed in strengthening the economy and creating jobs.

Job Growth Numbers for September 2010

The unemployment rate clocked in at 9.6 percent for September with 95,000 jobs lost. With the November elections only 25 days away, the jobless rate has now topped 9.5 percent for 14 straight months, the longest stretch since the 1930s. The Obama Administration and Democrats in Congress will try to spin today's numbers in a positive light, but they will have a hard time explaining why they should be allowed to stay in power when the economy shows little sign of improvement, with private sector only adding 64,000 positions, the weakest showing since June, and the underemployment rate jumping to 17.1 percent.

Job Growth Numbers for August 2010

Despite the Obama Administration's promise of a "summer of recovery," there were 54,000 jobs lost in August, with the unemployment rate edging up to 9.6 percent, and the underemployment rate rising to 16.7 percent. With only two months to go until the midterm elections, this dismal report is the latest reminder that the policies passed by the Democrats in Washington have hurt, not helped, the American people.

Job Growth Numbers for July 2010

There were more jobs lost than expected in July, with the unemployment rate holding at 9.5%. The 131,000 jobs lost, in addition to the 6.6 million people (45% of Americans) who said they were out of work for more than six months or more, may be a sign that the economic recovery, said to have begun in July 2009, continues to lose momentum. According to The Wall Street Journal, when also considering the revisions to unemployment summaries of prior months this year, "...the U.S. economy added an average of less than 100,000 jobs a month in the first seven months, a level that's not strong enough to bring unemployment down."

Job Growth Numbers for June 2010

The unemployment rate fell to 9.5% in June, but there were 125,000 jobs lost, reflecting the release of 225,000 temporary U.S. Census Bureau workers. While the Obama Administration and Congressional Democrats will attempt to spin June's job numbers, they will have a hard time explaining why the number of long-term unemployment (those jobless for 27 weeks and over) was unchanged at 6.8 million and why private sector employment continuously fails to meet expectations, coming in around 7.9 million below its December 2007 level.

Job Growth Numbers for May 2010

The unemployment rate improved slightly to 9.7 percent with 431,000 jobs gained in May, reflecting the hiring of 411,000 temporary employees hired to work for the Census 2010. By contrast, hiring by private employers, the backbone of the economy and job creation, slowed down. Private employment increased just 41,000 after rising 218,000 in April. The Obama Administration and Democrats in Congress may tout today's job numbers as a sign that the economy is improving, but when 96 percent of the jobs "created" last month are scheduled to be eliminated in the coming weeks, they would be better served looking for alternative solutions.

Job Growth Numbers for April 2010

Despite job gains, the unemployment rate rose to 9.9% in April, 2.5 percentage points higher than President Obama promised when advocating his stimulus bill in January 2009.  Counting people who have given up looking for work and part-time workers who would prefer to be working full time, the "underemployment rate" rose to 17.1 in April, alarmingly close to the record high of 17.4% in October and a foreboding sign of jobseekers' difficulty to find work. When only 21% of Americans consider the economy to be in good condition, according to the latest AP Poll, the Obama Administration and Democrats in Congress would do well to focus on job creation and abandon job killing and tax-hiking provisions like those found in the new health care bill.

Job Growth Numbers for March 2010

The unemployment rate remained unchanged at 9.7% in March and 162,000 jobs were created. Despite the positive growth, this falls short of economists' predictions of 200,000 new jobs for the month. Other details in this month's jobs report show reason for caution, with 1 million discouraged workers and a record high of 6.5 million Americans reporting to have been unemployed for 27 weeks or longer. While the positive job growth is welcome news, jobs will have to be created at a rate of 750,000 jobs per month in order for President Obama to meet his goal of 3.7 million jobs by the end of 2010, a target that will be harder to reach if Congress continues to push job-killing legislation like cap and trade.

Job Growth Numbers for Febuary 2010

There were 36,000 jobs lost in February with the unemployment rate holding at 9.7%, marking the 25th time in the past 26th months U.S. nonfarm payrolls declined. While there were not drastic changes in this month's report, the number of persons forced to work part time for economic reasons rose to 8.8 million and there were 1.2 discouraged workers, up from 473,000 in February 2009. As the Obama Administration and Democrats in Congress push highly unpopular health care legislation, it would serve the American people well for them to turn their focus on policies that would create jobs, such as extending critical tax policy and acting on pending free trade agreements.

Job Growth Numbers for January 2010

There were 20,000 jobs lost in January and unemployment fell to 9.7%. Despite the positive report, there are several factors that add to the uncertainty surrounding these numbers. An increase in temporary hiring, such as the hiring of 9,000 temporary workers for the Census 2010, as well as the Labor Department's annual benchmark revision to the survey, showing 600,000 more jobs lost in 2009 than originally reported, signal that January's job report may not be consistent with the underlying jobs trend. Still, one year after the stimulus was signed in to law, over three million jobs have been lost and over one million people have stopped looking for work. President Obama falls 5.2 million jobs short of number of jobs he said the stimulus would create, thus adding reason for caution as talks begin in Washington for a second stimulus and "jobs" bill.

Job Growth Numbers for December 2009

The final jobs report of 2009 was worse than expected, with the unemployment rate still at 10 percent and 85,000 jobs lost in December, the same month President Obama held a major jobs summit and promised to "take every responsible step to accelerate job creation." Additionally, the number of "discouraged" workers, or those who have abandoned the job search, rose to 929,000, and the "underemployment" rate, or the number of "discouraged" and "part-time" workers rose to 17.3 percent, up from 17.2 percent in October. Overall, employers cut 4.2 million jobs in 2009, and the average unemployment rate was 9.3 percent, compared to the averages of 5.8 percent for 2008 and 4.6 percent for 2007.

Job Growth Numbers for November 2009

The unemployment rate dropped to 10.0% in November, with the least number of jobs lost since the recession began. President Obama declared that, "we've seen a significant turnaround in the economy overall," at his jobs summit, but there are still 15.4 million Americans without a job and 861,000 discouraged workers giving up the job hunt all together. President Obama promised in February that "more than 90 percent of the jobs created by this plan will be in the private sector," but even his Administration's own documents admit more than half of the 640,329 jobs claimed to be "saved or created" by the stimulus have been in the public sector, 325,000 of them being in education alone.

Job Growth Numbers for October 2009

The 190,000 jobs lost in October exceeded economists' predictions and brought the unemployment rate to 10.2%, a level unseen since 1983. Nearly three and a half million jobs have been lost since the Obama stimulus was passed, putting the President almost 5 million jobs behind the goals he laid out in January. Even if one takes President Obama's recent claim that the stimulus has "created or saved" one million jobs at face value, he is still behind the pace needed to create 3.675 million jobs by the end of 2010. In order to meet that goal, he would have needed to save 1.438 million jobs by the end of October instead of coming up almost half a million jobs short.

Job Growth Numbers for September 2009

There were 263,000 jobs lost in September, many more than expected, bringing the unemployment rate to 9.8 percent. Job sectors that were predicted to benefit directly from the $787 billion stimulus package continue to lose the most jobs, including 64,000 Construction jobs and 51,000 Manufacturing jobs cut in September alone.

Job Growth Numbers for August 2009

There were 216,000 jobs lost in August, bringing the unemployment rate to a 26-year high of 9.7%. While jobs were lost in every sector but Education/Health, the average number of hours worked remained unchanged at a low 33.1 per week, indicating a deficit of new jobs and a continuation of cutbacks and layoffs by employers across the board.

Job Growth Numbers for July 2009

Even though jobs were lost at a slower rate in July, the unemployment level remains a sign of recession. There needs to be broad improvement in sectors other than Education/Health and Government in order for there to be viable economic recovery.

Job Growth Numbers for June 2009

Job Growth Numbers for May 2009

Overall, the Obama Administration is now 2.79 million jobs below where they should be to create 3.675 million jobs by the end of 2010.  The only sectors that created jobs in May were Education/Health and Leisure/Hospitality, although now only one sector (Education/Health) remains on track with the number of jobs they need to create.

Job Growth Numbers for April 2009

The Obama administration forecast that the stimulus bill would create 3.675 million American jobs by the end of 2010.  Has the stimulus been successful in meeting its promised goals?  Check Rove.com the first Friday of every month for the latest breakdown of how many and what type of  jobs have been created since the stimulus bill was signed to see if Obama is on pace to meet his promise.

Current Obama Jobs Deficit: -2.37 MILLION
April: 539,000 JOBS LOST

Job Growth Numbers for March 2009

The Obama administration forecast that the stimulus bill would create 3.675 million American jobs by the end of 2010.  Has the stimulus been successful in meeting its promised goals?  Check Rove.com the first Friday of every month for the latest breakdown of how many and what type of  jobs have been created since the stimulus bill was signed to see if Obama is on pace to meet his promise.

Current Obama Jobs Deficit: -1.63 MILLION
March: 663,000 JOBS LOST