Jan 5

Written by: Russ Henke
1/5/2008 10:34 AM 

As follow up to the December 9, 2007 blog entry in this space, the Labor Department reported January 4, 2008 that only a measly 18,000 net non-farm US jobs were added in December 2007, the fewest since August 2003. At the same time, the nation's overall unemployment rate rose to 5% (from 4.7%), its highest level since November 2005.

US manufacturing continued its ongoing loses, with 31,000 US manufacturing jobs disappearing in December. The health of the manufacturing sector is key to revenue growth in the US CAD/CAM industry.

For the third consecutive month, wages grew slower than the pace of inflation, cutting into the real income of many US workers. But the FED will likely reduce interest rates still further to boost the deteriorating stock market, and ignore its alleged commitment to control inflation.

In the face of the above data, Bush 43 publicly said January 4, 2008 that the “nation’s economy is strong and solid” and he made no mention of the atrocious December jobs report.