U.S. employers cut payrolls for a second straight month during February, slashing 63,000 jobs for the biggest monthly job decline in nearly five years as the labor market weakened steadily, a government report on Friday showed.
The Labor Department said last month’s cut in jobs followed an upwardly revised loss of 22,000 jobs in January instead of 17,000 reported a month ago. In addition, it said that only 41,000 jobs were created in December, half the 82,000 originally reported.
The back-to-back January and February job losses were the first consecutive monthly declines since May and June of 2003.
” U.S. employers cut payrolls for a second consecutive…” Yadayada. Typical NY Times chutzpah.
In the initial paragraph, they say U.S. employers “slashed” jobs by 63,000 in February. In the last line they say U.S. employers had “one bright spot” – that 38,000 jobs were added in the same month – February. Do they state whether the “slashed” jobs were a. people who were fired, b. unfilled jobs which were simply not created or filled, or c. what ? The Times does admit that 38,000 jobs were definitely added in February. They have yet to inform us whether any of the “slashed payrolls” were people who were actually fired. This is the current version of “yellow journalism” – another attempt to denigrate the current or any other Republican administration using pure balony dressed up as factual data.