Rise in jobless rates shows recovery is still fragile

Recently released unemployment numbers surprised many analysts and government officials and certainly made the case for another look at the policies that the leaders in Washington are debating right now. The Dow may have dodged the poor figures to end the week in a high note but it has caused some concern on what to do next in a seemingly fragile economic recovery.

The latest report from the Labor Department showed a 9.8 percent rise in unemployment for the month of November, the highest since April this year. The worse-than-expected job numbers had many analysts scratching their heads because of improving retail and manufacturing numbers in the past months.

Politicians particularly the Republicans in Congress were quick to build their case against any move to increase taxes.

However, some argue that neither tax cuts nor tax credits can fix the problem since businesses are not able to grow anyway with the current economic situation where demand is anemic.

Economists generally projected a 150,000 rise in payrolls but the Labor Department announced only a 39,000 increase from the same period last year. Declining manufacturing jobs hurt the Obama administration’s efforts to bring Americans back to work.

Underemployed workers—people who work part time but hope to find full-time jobs—continue to remain high at 17 percent. The number of people unemployed for 6 months or more is at its highest in 3 months.

This is particularly surprising since November is usually the month where retailers begin to hire more workers because of the start of the shopping season.