The February Employment Situation
By: Hope Wilkos, Writer/Blogger Photographer: George Whylie Videographer: Maxine NolanIt is hard to believe that we are beginning a new month and already closing the door on the first two months of 2012.
Today the update on the employment situation in February was released by The White House.
We are slowly beginning to see some progress in part due to the current economic policies. It is crucial to continue to assist sectors severely harmed by the bubble economy that misdirected investment and created too few durable jobs.
In the past two years, close to 429,000 manufacturing jobs have been added. The President is proposing tax incentives for manufacturers, enhanced training for the workforce and measures to create manufacturing hubs.
Employment rose in the month of February by 227,000 jobs. Private sector payrolls increased by 233,000 jobs. Although the unemployment rate remained stable at 8.3%, it has fallen by 0.8 percentage points over the last 6 months.
The labor force increased by 476,000. This is mainly due to less workers leaving the workforce. In the last 24 months, more than 3.9 million jobs have been added to the private sector. Net additions over a 12 month period are 2.2 million jobs. In the last 6 months, 1.3 million private sector jobs were added, the most of any 6 month period in nearly 6 years.
Health care and social assistance employment had a net increase of 61,100, temporary help services by 45,200, leisure and hospitality by 44,000 and manufacturing by 31,000. Construction lost 13,000 jobs, reflecting a loss of 15,400 specialty trade contractor jobs. Federal government employment fell by 7,000 jobs.
Once again we are continuing on an optimistic upswing and we will be eager to see what the month of March brings in the employment forefront.
Comments are closed.