July & August jobs update

Nationwide

Here are the latest numbers, with revisions, since April:

Month	Change	Employment	Unemployment Rate
Apr.	+112,000	135,017,000	4.7%
May	+100,000	135,117,000	4.6%
June	+134,000	135,251,000	4.6%
July	+123,000	135,374,000	4.8%
Aug.	+188,000	135,562,000	4.7%
Sept.	+51,000	135,613,000	4.6%

April was revised downward from +126,000 to +112,000. May was revised upward from +75,000 to +100,000. June was revised upward from +124,000 to +134,000. July was revised upward from +113,000 to +123,000.

Job growth has been moderate this year. September’s job performance looks low, but given past history it’s likely to be revised up later. And there have been months in the last couple years where job growth has been this low, but it’s picked back up again the next month.

Colorado

Here are the latest numbers, with revisions, since April:

Month	Change	Employment	Unemployment Rate
Apr.	-1,100	2,263,100	4.3%
May	+1,400	2,264,500	4.5%
June	+5,100	2,269,600	4.5%
July	+7,200	2,276,800	4.7%
Aug.	+5,800	2,282,600	4.8%

April was revised down quite a bit, from +500, as reported earlier, to -1,100. May went unchanged. June was revised up quite a bit from +1,300 to +5,100.

Colorado has gained 33,000 jobs above and beyond the benchmark set in Dec., 2000.

Denver Metro Area

Here are the latest numbers, with revisions, since April:

Month	Change	Employment	Unemployment Rate
Apr.	+9,900	1,205,100	4.4%
May	+10,500	1,215,600	4.4%
June	+11,700	1,227,300	4.9%
July	-7,000	1,220,300	4.8%
Aug.	+1,600	1,221,900	4.8%

April was revised downward from +10,100 to +9,900. May remained unchanged. June was revised down from +14,500 to +11,700. 

Growth was going very well from April through June. The increases in employment went up to what used to be about average for the area.

Denver is down 17,800 jobs from its benchmark set in Dec., 2000.

Boulder County

Here are the latest numbers, with revisions, since April:

Month	Change	Employment	Unemployment Rate
Apr.	+500	162,700	3.6%
May	+1,000	163,700	3.7%
June	-500	163,200	4.2%
July	-2,600	160,600	4.1%
Aug.	-600	160,000	4.1%

April was revised downward form +600 to +500. May remained unchanged. June was revised upward from -1,000 to -500 jobs.

Boulder County took quite a fall in July, and August didn’t help, yet our unemployment rate actually decreased.

Boulder County is down 11,500 jobs from its benchmark set in Dec., 2000.

Dow hits new high

It’s official. The Dow Jones Industrial average has finally risen above it’s previous record set in January, 2000. It’s taken almost 7 years. It closed yesterday at 11,727. Given the way things have been going I don’t expect it to rise above that level for a while, but I could be wrong. I listened to the news and analysts are attributing the rise to the slump in the housing market.

The analysis before was that the reason the Dow had not recovered for so long was that people were putting their investment money into the housing market, due to the low interest rates. This was driven by the Fed, which lowered those rates when the stock market took a large plunge in 2000, and the recession had hit. The stock market was considered too risky with the shams pulled by Enron, Global Crossing, and WorldCom. The Fed wanted to encourage borrowing, and that’s what happened. Since interest rates have been rising, and so have land values, the housing market topped off earlier this year. And investors have been looking for someplace else to put their money. As the article I link to notes, some of the commodities have been falling. Oil and gold have both fallen off their highs. So now investors are probably putting their money in the only place they feel they can continue to make some money: back in the stock market.