Economy

Obama will call the May jobs report good news, but it isn't.

"Total nonfarm employment in May reached 138.463 million, surpassing the previous high point of 138.365 million in January 2008, the Labor Department said."

So finally, the economy has more jobs than it did before the recession, but those jobs pay less, and the population has grown.

"But Shierholz noted that the working-age population has grown by 14.5 million people since January 2008. She estimated the economy is still 6.9 million jobs short of where it was at the start of the recession, given that growth. The gap is reflected in the unemployment rate. The Labor Department said Friday that the rate held steady in May at 6.3%, the lowest level since September 2008. But the rate was 5% when the recession began in December 2007, and economists say that’s roughly the full employment level.
And the unemployment rate might overstate the health of the labor market.
The labor force participation rate held steady in May at 62.8%, the lowest level since 1978, and Federal Reserve policymakers said they were using other indicators in addition to the unemployment rate to determine how much stimulus the economy still needs.
May's job growth was solid but unspectacular, down from 282,000 jobs added in April and roughly in line with analysts' expectations. The Labor Department initially estimated April's job growth at 288,000."

Not good.

Labor force participation of 62.8 remains at 36 year low. Seven million have dropped out since Obama took office.