The numbers: The United States lost jobs in December for the first time in eight months as the coronavirus again affected the economy and forced companies to resort to more layoffs.
The government and the private sector laid off 140,000 jobs last month, the Bureau of Labor Statistics said on Friday.
The decline in employment was the first since last April, when the United States lost 20.8 million jobs this month alone.
The economy still lacks about 10 million jobs that existed before the pandemic broke out, with little prospect of them recovering soon.
Empty patio tables in a dining room in California. Coronavirus is once again costing the economy jobs.
AFP via Getty Images
If in the report there was some news about goods, the layoffs were concentrated in restaurants and other businesses and depended on a large number of customers. In fact, many other segments of the economy recorded strong employment gains last month.
The official unemployment rate, meanwhile, remained unchanged at 6.7%. However, economists estimate that real unemployment is a few points higher because the official unemployment rate does not include about 4 million people who left the labor force last year.
Read: Unemployment claims are still very high at the end of 2020
“People leaving the workforce are a big problem,” said Thomas Barkin, president of the Federal Reserve.
In the first operations, US stocks rose slightly. The Dow Jones Industrial Average DJIA,
set a new record on Thursday as investors move ahead of current economic hardships to better times by the end of the year as more people are vaccinated.
What happened: Employment plummeted to 372,000 in bars and restaurants as customers fled and many states imposed business restrictions in an effort to curb a record increase in coronavirus cases nationwide.
Many companies had to lay off workers for the second or third time and some even had to close permanently.
Recreation jobs (theme parks, casinos and the like) also declined by 92,000 and the hotel industry eliminated 24,000 positions.
Added to the loss of employment, employment fell by 63,000 in private education and 45,000 in government.
The news was not bad at all: employment rose in other major segments of the economy.
Recruitment increased by 161,000 in white-collar professional ranks, for example, and by 121,000 in retail stores, although the increase in retail employment was exaggerated by seasonal changes.
Construction companies also added 51,000 jobs in a housing sales boom, while manufacturers added 38,000 workers to their payrolls. And employment rose by 47,000 among carriers and transportation companies that deliver more packages than ever to homes and businesses.
Recruitment was also stronger in November and October than previously reported. The number of new jobs created in November rose to 336,000, from 245,000. Labor earnings in October were revised up to 654,000, from 610,000.
General image: The U.S. economy has not been as affected by the coronavirus outbreak in late 2020 as during the initial attack last spring.
However, the momentum has clearly diminished. Economic growth and recruitment are unlikely to accelerate again until vaccinations are more widespread and the pandemic is over. Unemployment is expected to remain high at least until the summer.
What do they say? “This is a major setback for the labor market and the economy, but the narrow concentration of losses due to restrictions maintains a positive light on the possible post-vaccine recovery,” said senior economist Sal Guatieri and BMO Capital Markets.
“This is a pause in the recovery, not a total stop,” said chief economist Chris Low of FHN Financial.
Market reaction: The Dow Jones Industrial Average DJIA,
and S&P 500 SPX,
opened slightly higher on Friday’s business.
Investors are betting on a stronger economy in 2021, helped by more federal incentives from a Democratic president and a Democratic-controlled Congress.