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Politics : Don't Blame Me, I Voted For Kerry -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: JakeStraw who wrote (997)	2/6/2004 9:06:47 AM
From: ChinuSFO	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 81568

Here Jake, let us get to the issues: January Payrolls Weaker Than Expected Fri February 06, 2004 08:32 AM ET WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. economy created just 112,000 new jobs in January, far fewer than expected, government data showed on Friday, in a disappointing report that will weigh on President Bush's re-election campaign. The fifth straight monthly gain in non-farm payrolls followed a revised increase of 16,000 new jobs in December, the Labor Department said. The unemployment rate ticked down to 5.6 percent, the lowest since January 2002, from 5.7 percent the previous month - but those numbers are taken from a separate, smaller, survey. Analysts had been expecting the improving economy to create 150,000 new jobs in January. They were looking for the unemployment rate to hold steady at 5.7 percent. Many of the new jobs came from a 76,000 increase in the retail sector. But analysts had said before the report that a seasonal adjustment quirk would be the main reason for such a rise. They said there would be a gain because retailers took on fewer employees than expected in the holiday shopping months, which would mean that according to the seasonal adjustments in the report there would be fewer layoffs in January. The troubled manufacturing sector cut jobs for the 42nd month in a row, despite some signs of a revival in factories. The report included annual benchmark revisions but these did not lead to a change in the overall picture of a weak jobs market. Economists and policy makers will be closely looking at the report for evidence of an improvement in the labor market, which is seen as the key to a sustained economic recovery. The Federal Reserve is expected to keep interest rates on hold until signs of this emerge.