I was afraid this would happen.
U.S. Payrolls Fell 17,000 in January; Jobless Rate at 4.9%
By Bob Willis
Feb. 1 (Bloomberg) -- The U.S. economy unexpectedly lost jobs in January for the first time in more than four years, raising the odds the Federal Reserve will need to cut interest rates more than anticipated to head off an economic slowdown.
Payrolls fell by 17,000 after an 82,000 gain in December that was larger than initially reported, the Labor Department said today in Washington. The jobless rate declined to 4.9 percent from 5 percent in December.
The drop in employment in the wake of tighter credit, a deeper housing slump and a stumbling stock market, is the clearest sign yet that the U.S. expansion is at risk. Payrolls are one of the indicators, along with wages, production and sales, that help determine the start of economic contractions.
``The labor market is very close to the edge here and it would not take much to push the economy over the cliff,'' Chris Rupkey, senior financial economist at Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi UFJ Ltd. in New York, said before the report. ``More and more companies are reporting layoffs. Now we are seeing that the economy is, indeed, perhaps just inches away from a recession.''
None of the 80 economists surveyed by Bloomberg had predicted the decline in payrolls, which was the first since August 2003. The median forecast in the survey projected payrolls would rise by 70,000, compared with an initially reported gain of 18,000 in December. Forecasts of an increase ranged from 5,000 to 160,000. [more]
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=a6RXEUjetyGE&refer=home