Another home run month for the labor economy as the Biden administration continues to rapidly dig out of the Trump Depression hole that cost us 22 million jobs.
The American economy added 531,000 jobs in October, the Labor Department said Friday, a sharp rebound from the previous month and a sign that employers are feeling more optimistic as the latest coronavirus surge eases.
Economists polled by Bloomberg had been looking for a gain of 450,000 jobs. The unemployment rate declined to 4.6 percent, from 4.8 percent.
The October gain was an improvement from the 312,000 positions added in September — a number that was revised upward on Friday, along with the August figure, providing a more upbeat picture of the last few months.
The increase in employment was broad, with sizable gains at restaurants and bars, as well as in factories and offices. And in another sign that conditions are gradually returning to normal, the proportion of employed people who worked remotely at some point last month fell to 11.6 percent from 13.2 percent.
“This was a strong employment report that shows the resilience of the labor market recovery from the pandemic,” said Scott Anderson, chief economist at Bank of the West in San Francisco. “I think we will see a pretty strong bounce back in economic growth in the fourth quarter.”
Hiring has seesawed this year along with the pandemic, especially in vulnerable sectors like hospitality and retail, where workers must deal face to face with customers. White-collar employees have fared better, because many can work remotely.
Some employers are complaining of a shortage of workers, as many people remain on the sidelines of the job market. The labor force participation rate — the share of the working-age population employed or looking for a job — was flat in October, at 61.6 percent, and up slightly among those 25 to 54.
The stubbornly low participation rate underscores the damage the pandemic has done to the economy, and why it will take time to recover, despite strong months like October.
Still, even with the lower workforce participation numbers, we'll climb out of the hole next summer. Rememeber, the Trump regime's "recovery" stalled out last winter when we were still ten million jobs in the hole. It's Biden's policies that got us more than halfway out from there in just 9 months.
Give it another nine months and we'll be back in business, hopefully after today's infrastructure plan vote in the House.
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