where are the jobs?

oh. there's a few.


but wait. the unemployment rate actually went up, from 9.7 to 9.9%. that's bad, right?

Despite the increase in jobs, the unemployment rate rose, mostly because the government said 195,000 workers re-entered the labor force after giving up on job hunting during the recession. When jobless people do not look for work, they are not counted in the official unemployment rate.

“Of course one of the headlines is that the unemployment rate rose, but the rise was more than accounted for by a surge in the labor force,” [James O’Sullivan, chief economist at MF Global] said.

but these are all government jobs, right?

Of the 290,000 jobs created in April, 231,000 of them were in the private sector. The private sector has actually added 523,000 new jobs in 2010.

This includes 44,000 manufacturing jobs, which is the most manufacturing jobs added to the U.S. economy since August, 1998. Overall, April was the strongest month for jobs growth since March, 2006.