6 Key Facts About The State Of The American Jobs Market In 2012

By Pat Garofalo and Travis Waldron/Think Progress

The Bureau of Labor Statistics reported today that the economy created 157,000 jobs last month. With significant upward revisions to previous months (including revising November up to nearly 250,000 jobs created), the jobs picture for 2012 is much clearer. Here’s where things stand:

1) 181,00 jobs per month were created in 2012. In 2011, it was 175,000 per month. Calculated Risk charts the improvement:

2) 2.17 million jobs were created in 2012. As Steve Benen noted, this “is the best annual total since 2005, and tops seven of the eight years Bush/Cheney was in office.”

3) The so-called “fiscal cliff” didn’t create “uncertainty.” During the fourth quarter of last year, with the “fiscal cliff” looming, 201,000 jobs were created per month. “All these concerns that the fiscal uncertainty deterred businesses from hiring, they certainly haven’t materialized,” said UniCredit economist Harm Bandholz.

4) 74,000 government jobs were lost last year. This includes 9,000 layoffs last month, 2,000 of which were in education.  Since February 2010, the public sector has lost 600,000 jobs.

5) 5.5 million lost jobs have been recovered. As Bloomberg News noted, “The economy has recovered 5.51 million of the 8.74 million jobs that were lost as a result of the last recession.”

6) About 100,000 construction jobs were created in the last four months. In a sign that the housing market is rebounding, the economy has added 296,000 construction jobs since January 2011, and a third of those gains occurred in the final four months of 2012. Still, construction employment is 2 million jobs below its 2006 peak.