According to the latest employment report released last week by the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the private sector added 192,000 jobs and government broke even as federal jobs declined and local jobs picked up. Construction continued to rebound and retail trade recovered from a down February as winter weather eased its grip on the North.
Economists’ reactions were muted. Tony Villamil, Founder and Principal of The Washington Economics Group based in Coral Gables, said “nearly five years after the end of the recession, the recovery should be creating more jobs. To put a dent in the unemployment backlog, the ecoonomy should be creating 200,000 to 250,000 each month, not the 178,000 average of the past three months. The start of 2014 has been slower than the previous two years, though an especially harsh Northern winter is expected to be the culprit.” “We are not really making a lot of headway on unemployment and underunemployment,” he added. Read full story
