In May, the unemployment rate increased to 8.2 percent. The unemployment rate has remained above 8 percent for 40 straight months, which the longest period of over 8 percent unemployment since monthly records began in 1948.
When President Obama pushed through his $831-billion stimulus bill, his administration claimed unemployment would drop below 6 percent by May 2012.
The “real” unemployment rate is 14.8 percent for May 2012 and has remained above 14 percent for a record-setting 41 consecutive months. The real unemployment includes those who are underemployed and those not in the labor force, but wanted and were available for work and had looked for a job at some point in the past year.
Only 69,000 jobs were created last month, which is the smallest monthly jobs gain since May of 2011. The April jobs report was revised downward to just 77,000 new jobs. The economy needs to create 150,000 new jobs each month just to keep up with population growth.
The labor force participation rate is 63.8 percent, which is near a 30-year low.
23.2 million Americans remain unemployed, underemployed, or are only marginally attached to the workforce.
5.4 million Americans have been out of work for at least 27 weeks. The number of long-term unemployed has doubled under the Obama administration.
28,000 construction workers lost their jobs last month. However, President Obama continues to block the Keystone XL pipeline, which would create 20,000 jobs – most of which are construction jobs.
President Obama’s endless train wreck of new regulations, record-setting deficits, higher taxes, and new Obamacare mandates continues to be a drag on economic growth and job creation.
GDP only grew 1.9 percent in the first quarter of this year, which was well below expectations.
Half of recent college graduates are unemployed or underemployed in the Obama economy.
