The U.S. economy may have added more jobs in the month of July, but the unemployment rate still took a very small jump in the wrong direction - up.
The Labor Department’s monthly jobs report showed that there were 209,000 jobs added last month, mostly thanks to new manufacturing, construction, retail, professional and business services jobs.
Still, the unemployment rate moved slightly up to 6.2 percent, compared to 6.1 percent in June. In addition, the number of unemployed persons stayed mostly the same at 9.7 million. However, it is important to note that the unemployment rate has dropped 1.1 percent over the past 12 months, and the number of unemployed persons is down 1.7 million.
The country does still have a large group of people who have been out of work for 27 weeks or more. That number stands at 3.2 million and they make up 32.9 percent of the unemployed.
The number of employed blacks moved up to 11.4 percent in July, and the number of women out of work rose to 5.7 percent.
Finally, the Labor Department did also adjust numbers for May and June up. Both months saw 15,000 more jobs added than previously reported.
Today’s news did follow the Commerce Department’s Thursday report that the U.S.’ gross domestic product (GDP) was up 4 percent in the second quarter of 2014, following the dreary winter.
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