What’s the good news about 345,000 lost jobs?
Job losses are never a good sign, however around 3 million people found new jobs. While the end result is a net loss of jobs, the tide is beginning to turn in a new direction.

Many employers have made major cuts. However, they are beginning to realize that, in order to get the work done, maintain productivity, and bring new innovations to the marketplace, they cannot let go of any more of their talent, which helps to explain the drop in job losses this month.

What we’re not yet seeing, however, is an increase in the hours in the average work week, which would indicate that employers are about to aggressively hire more staff. While we see peaks of this in certain professions – accounting, IT, engineering, and healthcare – generally, the length of the average work week is the lowest it’s been in the last 10 years.

As everyone searches for signs of recovery, there are several indicators to keep a close eye on beyond the main payroll number – hours worked, wage change, GDP movement and consumer confidence, just to name a few.

Monthly U.S. job losses (12 month snapshot)
Source: Bureau of Labor Statistics