Was in line with consensus. [0] WSJ RealTime Economics provides a survey of assessments [1].

Figure 1: Nonfarm payroll employment, seasonally adjusted, various releases. NBER defined recession dates shaded gray (assuming recession has not ended by 2009M03). Source: BLS, employment situation, various releases, and St. Louis Fed FRED II.

Aggregate hours worked continue to decline at a faster pace than employment; they are now 5.6% below 07M12, as compared to 3.2% for employment (in log terms).

Figure 2: Log Nonfarm payroll aggregate weekly hours (blue), and Log Nonfarm payroll employment (red), seasonally adjusted, normalized to 0 in 2007M12. NBER defined recession dates shaded gray (assuming recession has not ended by 2009M03). Source: BLS, employment situation, February release, via St. Louis Fed FRED II, and author’s calculations.

Discussion of the results from the household survey (not pretty either!) at RTE.

Technorati Tags: nonfarm payroll employment, recession,
hours worked, job loss.

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