Surprising Number Of Americans Got Jobs Last Month

Yesterday's worry that the economy is weakening in the face of high gasoline prices mostly disappeared today with news that an unexpectedly large number of Americans found jobs last month.

Despite weeks of pain at the pump, forcing consumers to trim other spending, the Labor Department reports the economy added 244,000 new non-farm jobs in April. The unemployment rate edged up to nine percent, but even that is being interpreted as positive, because it means many Americans who had given up on looking for a job started looking again.

“Payroll increases in April were surprisingly strong with the private sector increase the largest in over five years,” said Economist Joel Naroff, of Naroff Economic Advisors, in Holland, Pa. “Almost 65 percent of the industries posted gains.”

More good news

And there was more positive data. The job gains for February and March were revised upward. So far this year, over 850,000 new private sector workers have been hired. Naroff says that?s well above expectation and is quite impressive.

“All across the board, the lights were flashing green as even construction firms expanded their workforces,” Naroff said. “Manufacturers responded to rising demand by putting on lots of workers, retailers needed plenty of salespeople to handle the late Easter, more truckers were required to haul the goods, professional services were in greater demand and health care, restaurant and real estate businesses needed to expand their payrolls.”

The number of temporary workers was down, which may reflect a growing confidence that the recovery will continue. When workers are now being hired, they are more likely to get full-time jobs.

The downside to prosperity

The one downside to the new optimism is what it is likely to do to gasoline prices. Thursday's big drop in oil prices was, in large part, based on the fear that the economy is slowing down again. With a slower economy, the reasoning goes, there will be less demand for energy.

In response to oil's big drop, the increasing national average price of gasoline stalled today, actually dipping by a fraction of a cent from yesterday. But oil appears to be rallying today, trading back up over $100 a barrel. A continuation of the crude oil rally could well mean that gas prices will continue their climb in the day ahead.