After last Friday’s print of 9.7 percent for the unemployment rate, more than a few pundits are calling the 10.1 percent jobless rate seen back in October the high for the cycle. It seems to be way too early to make that call based on the millions of “discouraged” workers who, when they start looking for work again, will suddenly count as “unemployed” again.

Stephen Roach seems to agree, figuring that the real jobless rate today is 11.5 percent.

The odds of a double-dip recession are now 40 percent? That’s good to know. There’s been a lot of talk about another downturn for the U.S. economy, but it comes as news to me that they’ve already taken the time to poll economists and that they were this pessimistic.

All the talk about the severe winter weather grossly distorting the monthly labor report turned out to be just that – talk – as both nonfarm payrolls and the unemployment rate were surprisingly tame during the month of February.

Due largely to a decline in construction jobs, nonfarm payrolls fell by 36,000 in February after declines of 109,000 in December and 26,000 in January. There were total upward revisions of 35,000 for prior months’ data, the December total adjusted up from -150,000 and the January job losses slightly greater than the originally reported -20,000.

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The Labor Department reported that initial claims for unemployment insurance fell from an upwardly revised three-month high of 498,000 to 469,000 during the week ended February 27th. As shown below, the four-week moving average fell by 3,500 to 470,750, a level that is still quite high as compared to prior recessions.
For example, during the 2001 recession, the four-week moving average exceeded the current level only four times and, during the 1991 recession, this level was surpassed for just two months. Despite the widespread belief (amongst economists, at least) that the recession ended last summer, weekly jobless claims are still about the same as when the 1991 and 2001 recessions were at their worst.

More evidence that the current recession has little in common with the last two comes in the continuing and extended claims data. Continuing claims fell to 4.5 million, a 13-month low, however, extended claims continue to rise, now at 5.9 million.