The U.S. Continue to Bleed Jobs
March 6, 2009
The U.S. lost 651,000 non-farm employment in the month of February 2009, marking 14 consecutive months of decline. Job losses were widespread across nearly all major industry sectors. With the previous two months of job cuts revised significantly higher, the unemployment rate rose from 7.6% to 8.1%, the highest in 25 years. Since the recession began in December 2007, about 4.4 million jobs have been lost, with more than half of the decrease occurring in the last four months. While the figures were not as bad as the market feared, which had been expecting 648,000 jobs lost, the report still paints a grim picture of the US economy. Overall the USD was mixed across the board.