As had been feared, the U.S. economy lost more than one half millionjobs in December, capping the worst year for job losses since World WarII.
Labor Departmentfigures show 524,000 people lost their jobs in December. This follows584,000 job losses in November. The Labor Department report reveals aneconomy in free fall with the unemployment rate up nearly one-halfpercent to 7.2 percent and rising. The unemployment rate isat a 16-year high.
"In the third quarter [of the year] we lost 600,000jobs, in round numbers," said Stuart Hoffman, chief economist at PNC Bank inPittsburgh, speaking on Bloomberg Television. "In the fourth quarter we lost 1.6million jobs, and a near record job decline for the year. Andunfortunately the rate of job decline really just accelerateddramatically in the last three months."
President-electObama said the job loss figures show that America is facing adevastating economic crisis. He repeated his appeal for earlycongressional action to approve a multi-hundred billion dollargovernment program to stimulate the economy.
For all of 2008 theU.S. economy lost 2.8 million jobs, this in an economy thathad created millions of new jobs earlier in the decade. The U.S.economy has been in recession for over one year and the downturn isaccelerating amid projections that economic output is currentlydeclining at a more than four percent annual rate.
Financialmarkets were not greatly impacted by the employment report where badnews had been anticipated. Oil prices were steady at around $40per as the slowing world economy has brought prices down over 70percent from their peak back in July. Most stock markets lost groundin Friday trading.