Unemployment Climbs to 9.5 Percent

July 2, 2009 by Jeff · Leave a Comment
Filed under: Economy, Politics 

Unemployment climbed to its highest level in 26 years rising to 9.5 percent in June. All told, 14.7 million people were unemployed in June:

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – U.S. employers cut far more jobs than expected last month and the unemployment rate hit 9.5 percent, the highest in nearly 26 years, underscoring the likelihood of a long, slow recovery from recession.

The loss of 467,000 jobs reported by the Labor Department on Thursday was 100,000 more than Wall Street economists had expected, with virtually no sector of the economy spared.

Since the economy fell into recession in December 2007, 6.5 million nonfarm jobs have been lost and the unemployment rate has nearly doubled.

“It looks like the economy was still losing substantial momentum as the second quarter came to a close. This report is weak across the board,” said William Sullivan, chief economist at the JVB Financial Group in Boca Raton, Florida.

U.S. stock prices fell, with the Dow Jones industrial average down 2 percent by afternoon as investors worried the data darkened the recovery outlook. Prices for safe-haven U.S. government debt rose.

Clearly we’re headed in the wrong direction… I said last month that I thought the numbers were misleading and shouldn’t be take them at face value. Simply put we aren’t anywhere near the bottom yet, unemployment is going to continue to rise and I suspect we’ll see unemployment well above 10% and U-6 above 20% before we do reach bottom.

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