Jobs Report Shows Economy Improving, but Also Long-Term Damage

And the unemployment rate fell by a full percentage point to 6.9 percent, a steeper drop than any single month in the 71 years of employment data stretching from 1948 to 2019. (There have been three other months in the pandemic recovery this year with steeper declines.)

A look at the industries that are adding jobs suggests this recovery is relatively broad-based. In particular, some of the sectors that would be expected to keep bleeding jobs if we were settling in for a protracted recession are rebounding. Construction employment rose by 84,000 in October, retail rose by 104,000, and transportation and warehousing was up by 63,000. Temporary help services employment rose by 109,000, a sign that employers need more labor even if they aren’t willing to make permanent hires yet.

All that is particularly impressive when you consider that we’re now starting to feel the brunt of the expiration of federal bailout efforts. The $1,200 stimulus checks many Americans received in the spring have probably already been spent. Expanded unemployment benefits have now been unavailable for three months. There has been no re-upping of the government’s program to support small business. Yet the economy has not fallen into the abyss.

So it is entirely reasonable to celebrate the progress the economy is making.

If, on the other hand, you take a more dour approach, there is a lot of reason to worry about the ways the economy is still deeply broken — and about the signs that healing will not be a speedy process, especially if the coronavirus pandemic continues to worsen over the winter, as appears likely.

For one, even if this rate of job creation can keep up for another 13 months, that still implies a lengthy period in which the economy is functioning far below potential. That in turn implies that many people who want to work will remain jobless for reasons out of their control. They may be out of work for long enough that they are at risk of losing their connections to the labor force and their skills, as well as the income they need to support their families.

Article source: https://www.nytimes.com/2020/11/06/upshot/jobs-report-economy-damage.html